RHEED investigations of MBE-growth kinetics of Si on Si(111) and SiC on SiC(100)

Reflection high-energy electron diffraction has been used to study the molecular beam epitaxy-growth kinetics of Si on Si(111) and of SiC on SiC(100). By means of a simple kinematic scattering theory we have estimated diffusion barrier energy values for adatom migration and nucleation energies. Results clearly show that growth kinetics are different at low and high temperatures for both systems. At lower temperatures the nucleation can be explained by a single adatom diffusion process, whereas at higher temperatures much higher activation energies may be attributed to an island coarsening process. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.