Surface-induced charge disturbances and piezoelectricity in insulating crystals

The charge disturbance induced by a surface in a three-dimensional insulating crystal is studied in the self-consistent-field approximation, when the surface is parallel to one of the lowest-index crystal planes. The disturbance is shown to decay exponentially into the interior of the crystal with a decay rate which depends only on the band structure of the infinite crystal and the position of the Fermi level relative to any surface states that …