Fluctuations of an atomic ledge bordering a crystalline facet

Abstract

When a high symmetry facet joins the rounded part of a crystal, the step line density vanishes as square root of r with r denoting the distance from the facet edge. This means that the ledge bordering the facet has a lot of space to meander as caused by thermal activation. We investigate the statistical properties of the border ledge fluctuations. In the scaling regime they turn out to be non-Gaussian and related to the edge statistics of Gaussian unitary ensemble multimatrix models.