Coexistent compressive and tensile strain in Ag thin films on Si(1 1 1)-(7 7) surfaces

Growth and strain behavior of thin Ag films on Si substrates have been investigated by scanning tunneling microscopy, cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy and high resolution X-ray diffraction studies. Ag islands formed on Si at room temperature growth show strongly preferred heights and flat top. At low coverage [01 monolayer (ML)], Ag islands with (1 1 1) orientation containing two atomic layers of Ag are overwhelmingly formed [D.K. Goswami, K. Bhattacharjee, B. Satpati, S. Roy, P.V. Satyam, B.N. Dev, Surf. Sci. 601 (2007) 603]. A thicker (40 ML) annealed film shows two closely spaced Ag(1 1 1) diffraction peaks—one weak and broad and the other narrow and more intense. The broad peak corresponds to an average expansion (0.21%) and the narrow intense peak corresponds to a contraction (0.17%) of the Ag(1 1 1) planar spacing compared to the bulk value. This coexistence of compressive and tensile strain can be explained in terms of changes in the Ag lattice during the heating–cooling cycle due to thermal expansion coefficient mismatch between Ag and Si