Molecular Beam Epitaxy

27In‐situ STM Study of MBE Growth Process

Shiro Tsukamoto

National Institute of Technology, Anan College, Tokushima, 774‐0017, Japan

27.1 Introduction

Sensory function keeps track of the surrounding situation and subsequent action continues. People have been constantly repeating this commonplace throughout the history of mankind. The era of the range that can be perceived by human eyes, ears, and so on was all. There was no need to determine the next action by understanding the area beyond it or below it. However, in recent years, the range handled by human beings has spread rapidly, and along with that, technology that senses and controls situations has spread with the momentum of progress. It goes without saying that the breakthrough of the semiconductor industry in particular cannot speak without improving the quality of semiconductor crystals. Today, it reaches control at the atomic/molecular level and faces a big wall. The main reason for this is that it is impossible with the present technology to determine how individual atoms and/or molecules become an aggregate like crystals by observing the process as individual movements on the spot. There are many theories, but we cannot prove them without actually seeing it. In addition, the crystal growth process involves too many elements, and is complicated and mutual. In a simplified model, it can only explain part of it. It is beyond difficulty to explain the growth process of crystals in which heterogeneous atoms and/or molecules ...