Related papers: Anisotropic step stiffness from a kinetic model of…
Step meandering instability in a Burton-Cabrera-Frank (BCF)-type model for the growth of an isolated, atomically high step on a crystal surface is analyzed. It is assumed that the growth is sustained by the molecular precursors deposition…
We consider a simple model for the growth of isolated steps on a vicinal crystal surface. It incorporates diffusion and drift of adatoms on the terrace, and strong step and kink edge barriers. Using a combination of analytic methods and…
A continuum model for the dynamics of a single step with the strongly anisotropic line energy is formulated and analyzed. The step grows by attachment of adatoms from the lower terrace, onto which atoms adsorb from a vapor phase or from a…
A discrete version of deposition-diffusion equations appropriate for description of step flow on a vicinal surface is analyzed for a two-dimensional grid of adsorption sites representing the stepped surface and explicitly incorporating…
We study the step bunching kinetic instability in a growing crystal surface characterized by anisotropic diffusion. The instability is due to the interplay between the elastic interactions and the alternation of step parameters. This…
In order to study the unstable step motion on vicinal crystal surfaces we devise vicinal Cellular Automata. Each cell from the colony has value equal to its height in the vicinal, initially the steps are regularly distributed. Another array…
The steps at the crystal surfaces could be transparent for the migrating adatoms. In the case of significant transparency the velocity of a given step in a given moment is affected by detachment of atoms from rather distant steps in rather…
A method based on the kinetics of adatoms on a growing surface under epitaxial growth at low temperature in (1+1) dimensions is proposed to obtain a closed form of local growth equation. It can be generalized to any growth problem as long…
We study a recently proposed nonlinear evolution equation describing the collective step meander on a vicinal surface subject to the Bales-Zangwill growth instability [O. Pierre-Louis et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. (80), 4221 (1998)]. A careful…
We study the step meandering instability on a surface characterized by the alternation of terraces with different properties, as in the case of Si(001). The interplay between diffusion anisotropy and step stiffness induces a finite…
This paper provides an elementary introduction to the basic concepts used in describing epitaxial crystal growth in terms of the thermodynamics and kinetics of atomic steps. Selected applications to morphological instabilities of stepped…
Scanning tunneling microscopy experiments show that the unstable growth morphology observed during molecular beam homoepitaxy on slightly vicinal Si(001) surfaces consists of straight step bunches. The instability occurs under step- flow…
Below the roughening transition, crystal surfaces exhibit nanoscale line defects, steps, that move by exchanging atoms with their environment. In homoepitaxy, we analytically show how the motion of a step train in vacuum under strong…
We devise a new 1D atomistic scale model of vicinal growth based on Cellular Automaton. In it the step motion is realized by executing the automaton rule prescribing how adatoms incorporate into the vicinal crystal. Time increases after…
By taking account of the alternation of structural parameters, we study bunching of impermeable steps induced by drift of adatoms on a vicinal face of Si(001). With the alternation of diffusion coefficient, the step bunching occurs…
We studied the step dynamics during crystal sublimation and growth in the limit of fast surface diffusion and slow kinetics of atom attachment-detachment at the steps. For this limit we formulate a model free of the quasi-static…
We study the meandering instability during growth of an isolated nanostructure, a crystalline cone, consisting of concentric circular steps. The onset of the instability is studied analytically within the framework of the standard…
Using a Monte Carlo method on a lattice model of a vicinal surface with short-range step-step attraction, we show that, at low temperature and near equilibrium, there is an inhibition of the motion of macro-steps. This inhibition leads to a…
For low to moderate supersaturations, crystals grow by lateral build-up of new layers. The edges of the layers are known as "steps". We consider the rate of step advance on a flat crystal face under the influence of bulk diffusion in the…
The step bunching instability is studied in three models of step motion defined in terms of ordinary differential equations (ODE). The source of instability in these models is step-step attraction, it is opposed by step-step repulsion and…