Intermixing and three-dimensional islands in the epitaxial growth of Au on Ag(110)

Abstract

The epitaxial growth of Au on Ag(110) has been studied by scanning tunneling microscopy up to 2.5 ML. In the submonolayer range the results show that gold atoms are intermixed with the silver atoms in the top two layers. Above 1 ML, a two-dimensional fingerlike growth gives rise to anisotropic three-dimensional islands of gold. This ``intermixed Stranski-Krastanov'' growth mode is in quantitative agreement with ion channeling data which were previously interpreted as a bilayer growth mode [Fenter and Gustafsson, Phys. Rev. Lett. 64, 1142 (1990)].