A comparative STM and SPA-LEED study on the evolution of strain induced stripe pattern on Cu/Ni(100)

The epitaxial growth of Cu multilayers on Ni(100) is investigated by high-resolution LEED and variable temperature STM. Particular emphasis is put on the quantitative characterization of the recently discovered strain relief mechanism via internal {111} faceting. This mechanism is associated with the occurrence of patterns of orthogonal stripes at the film surface. The complementarity of real space and reciprocal space techniques are used to determine quantities such as stripe height, width and density with high accuracy. The pros and cons of local real space and integral reciprocal space techniques are discussed in detail. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.