Influence of substrate temperature, deposition rate and surface conditions on the epitaxial growth of copper on mica

Abstract

In this experimental investigation copper was deposited on mica substrates under UHV conditions. Both air-cleaved and vacuum-cleaved mica substrates were used. Evaporation rate and substrate temperature have been varied systematically over a wide range. The structure of the films was studied with X-ray methods (Laue-transmission photographs and rocking curves). It was observed that the polar orientation of the crystallites depends mainly on evaporation rate and substrate temperature. The azimuthal orientation, however, is strongly dependent upon the surface conditions of the substrate, i.e. a surface gas layer improves the azimuthal orientation significantly. On vacuum-cleaved substrates an improvement of the azimuthal orientation can only be achieved by high evaporation rates (> 2500 Å/s). These effects are explained by the dependence of the rotation jump frequency on the size of nuclei and clusters.