FORMATION OF BILAYER STEPS DURING GROWTH AND EVAPORATION OF SI(001) VICINAL SURFACES

A kinetic criterion for the stability of the single-height steps at slightly misoriented from (001)Si crystal faces has been derived on the basis of a quantitative treatment of the combined action of the surface diffusion and anisotropic growth kinetics. Double-height steps are predicted to develop during crystallization below some critical temperature that depends on the degree of misorientation. A further decrease of the temperature enhances the nucleation and growth of two-dimensional islands that leads to the simultaneous existence of 1 x 2 and 2 x 1 reconstructed domains. © 1990 The Japan Society of Applied Physics.