Chapter 34 - Growth of thin films

Abstract

This chapter highlights the theory of polylayer growth of thin films and its application to the description of their mode of growth. The nucleation-mediated growth of crystals is described by the Kolmogorov–Johnson–Mehl–Avrami (KJMA)-type theory of birth and spread of 2D clusters within the successive monolayers building up the crystal face. It finds a wide application in studies on the growth of thin films. An important feature of this theory of polylayer growth of crystals is that it describes both the early and the advanced stages of the process. The growth of a given crystal face is merely growth of a thin solid film on its own substrate; therefore, it is not surprising that the generalization of the theory of polylayer growth of crystals for the case of growth of thin solid films on foreign substrates allows a comprehensive description of all stages of film formation.