Investigation of homoepitaxial growth on bcc surfaces with STM and kinetic Monte Carlo simulation

Time-resolved in situ STM has been applied to the system Fe on Fe(110) to study the characteristics of homoepitaxial growth on bcc surfaces. Additionally the growth of W on W(110) has been investigated which shows the same behaviour at 500°C as iron at room temperature. The resulting data are compared with kinetic Monte Carlo simulation which include the correct symmetry of the bcc(110) surface. It is found that islands grow strongly anisotropically elongated in [100] which is due to a hindered diffusion at step edges along [001]. At room temperature the inter-layer diffusion is suppressed by a step edge barrier which leads at higher coverages to a kinetic roughening and a complete faceting of the surface. The developing stable facets were investigated by SPA-LEED.