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Applied Surface Science, Volume 288, 2014, Pages 166-171.
Daniel Marconi, Alia Ungurean
Department of Molecular and Biomolecular Physics, National Institute for Research and Development of Isotopic and Molecular Technologies, Donath 63-105, 400293 Cluj-Napoca, Romania
Abstract
We report here the effects of substrate temperature on the orientation and surface morphology of 100 nm thick gold films, using scanning tunneling microscopy and X-ray diffraction. The gold films were deposited using molecular beam epitaxy technique onto Si(1 1 1) 7 × 7 substrates. Ex situ characterizations are performed using scanning tunneling microscope at room temperature. X-ray diffraction measurements reveal the (1 1 1) orientation of the film deposited at 580 °C. We present data showing the evolution of the RMS roughness amplitude of the gold films as a function of substrate temperature during deposition. For our purposes, the best compromise between roughness and grain size is found to occur for a substrate temperature maintained at 580 °C.
