Initial growth processes of Ag on polar and non-polar semiconductor substrates

Initial growth processes of Ag on both InSb(111)A and α-Sn(111) substrates at room temperature have been investigated by using reflection high-energy electron diffraction and Auger electron spectroscopy. The results show that the growth features are quite different for each system: Ag grows in the Stranski-Krastanov mode on InSb(111)A, while for Ag/α-Sn(111) the majority of the deposited Ag atoms are consumed in forming an Ag-Sn alloy. Discrete variational-Xα calculations showed that an onset of such growth modes is closely related to interfacial chemical bonding features for both systems.