Growth of fcc(111) on bcc(110): Influence of growth and annealing temperature on epitaxy and surface morphology for Pd on Cr

Abstract

The effects of growth versus annealing temperature on epitaxial relationship and surface morphology were studied for Pd(111) films on Cr(110) surfaces. While the epitaxial orientation of the Pd films depends on film thickness as well as on growth temperature, subsequent annealing has no effect on the epitaxial orientation. Instead, additional annealing of room temperature grown films takes the surface morphology from an island to a terrace shape, which was not observed for samples directly grown at elevated temperatures. These different effects that growth and annealing temperature have, help understanding the resulting structure and morphology of the heteroepitaxial system.