Growth spiral patterns in electrodeposited silver

Abstract

To study the mechanism of crystal growth, silver electrodeposition on silver single crystal (100) surface was investigated by means of a differential interference microscope. The deposition was performed from an acid silver nitrate bath containing a small amount of the additives at various current densities. It was found that poly-amideamine played an important role in the conditions under which spirals grew. The screw dislocation groups of large Burgers vectors are produced by adding additives to the electrolytes, which indicates the importance of the impurities in the formation of screw dislocation groups. A mechanism for the formation of macro-steps by drawing together monatomic steps is discussed in terms of “step-bunching”. Several patterns of spiral growth, which were very useful to know the mechanism of basic crystal growth, were observed in electrodeposited silver. The growth patterns for two or more spirals on the deposit are also reported in relation to the theory of crystal growth.