We have studied the diffusion of the two organic molecules DC and HtBDC on the Cu(110) surface by scanning tunneling microscopy. Surprisingly, we find that long jumps, spanning multiple lattice spacings, play a dominating role in the diffusion of these molecules—the root-mean-square jump lengths are as large as 3.9 and 6.8 lattice spacings, respectively. The presence of long jumps is revealed by a new and simple method of analysis, which is tested by kinetic Monte Carlo simulations.

• Received 17 December 2001

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.88.156102