Memory effects during co-deposition of binary alloys

Abstract

The possibility of memory effects during the co-deposition of binary alloy with simultaneous phase separation is studied on the atomistic scale by the Stochastic Kinetic Mean-Field method. At first, the morphology map is found for the asymptotic structures obtained under various compositions of deposition flux and various deposition rates, starting from random alloy at the initial atomic plane. Such a map consists of “single-pattern” and “mixed-pattern” regions. At that, a new way of morphology quantification is suggested. The best candidates for keeping memory about the initial morphology (if it is not a random alloy anymore) are the systems from the “mixed-pattern region”. They indeed demonstrate the memory effects at least in mean-field modeling.