Related papers: Revisiting step instabilities on crystal surfaces.…
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…
The growth of crystal surfaces, under non-equilibrium conditions, involves the displacement of mono-atomic steps by atom diffusion and atom incorporations into steps. The time-evolution of the growing crystal surface is thus governed by a…
The distinction between absolute and convective instabilities is well known in the context of hydrodynamics and plasma physics. In this Letter, we examine an epitaxial crystal growth model from this point of view and show that a…
The formation of three-dimensional structures during the epitaxial growth of films is associated to the reflection of diffusing particles in descending terraces due to the presence of the so-called Ehrlich-Schwoebel (ES) barrier. We…
The growth of a crystal is usually determined by its surface. Many factors influence the growth dynamics. Energy barriers associated with the presence of steps most often decide about the emerging pattern. The height and type of…
Step meandering due to a deterministic morphological instability on vicinal surfaces during growth is studied. We investigate nonlinear dynamics of a step model with asymmetric step kinetics, terrace and line diffusion, by means of a…
We examine the step dynamics in a 1+1 dimensional model of epitaxial growth based on the BCF-theory. The model takes analytically into account the diffusion of adatoms, an incorporation mechanism and an Ehrlich-Schwoebel barrier at step…
The Burton-Cabrera-Frank (BCF) model for the flow of line defects (steps) on crystal surfaces has offered useful insights into nanostructure evolution. This model has rested on phenomenological grounds. Our goal is to show via scaling…
Bunching of steps at the surface of growing crystals can be induced by both directions of the driving force: step up and step down. The processes happen in different adatom concentrations and differ in character. In this study we show how…
We formulate a new (1+1)D step model of potentially unstable vicinal growth that we call "C+ - C-" model and study the step bunching process in it. The basic assumption is that the equilibrium adatom concentrations on both sides of the step…
We propose a one-dimensional model based on the Burton-Cabrera-Frank equations to describe the electromigration-induced step bunching instability on vicinal surfaces. The step drift resulting from atomic evaporation and/or deposition is…
The meander instability of a vicinal surface growing under step flow conditions is studied within a solid-on-solid model. In the absence of edge diffusion the selected meander wavelength agrees quantitatively with the continuum linear…
We report the results of computer simulations of epitaxial growth in the presence of a large Schwoebel barrier on different crystal surfaces: simple cubic(001), bcc(001), simple hexagonal(001) and hcp(001). We find, that mounds coarse by a…
We use kinetic Monte Carlo simulations to understand growth- and etching-induced step bunching of 6H-SiC{0001} vicinal surfaces oriented towards [1-100] and [11-20]. By taking account of the different rates of surface diffusion on three…
A discrete solid-on-solid model of epitaxial growth is introduced which, in a simple manner, takes into account the effect of an Ehrlich-Schwoebel barrier at step edges as well as the local relaxation of incoming particles. Furthermore a…
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…
We study step bunching under conditions of attachment/detachment limited kinetics in the presence of a deposition or sublimation flux, which leads to bunch motion. Analysis of the discrete step dynamics reveals that the bunch velocity is…
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…
The energetically driven Ehrlich-Schwoebel (ES) barrier had been generally accepted as the primary cause of the growth instability in the form of quasi-regular mound-like structures observed on the surface of thin film grown via molecular…
We investigate the nonlinear evolution of the Bales-Zangwill instability, responsible for the meandering of atomic steps on a growing vicinal surface. We develop an asymptotic method to derive, in the continuous limit, an evolution equation…