Scanning tunneling microscopy study of initial stages of silicon molecular beam epitaxy

Initial stages of Si molecular beam epitaxy on vicinal Si(001) substrates were investigated using scanning tunneling microscopy. It was found that at temperatures around 750 K first a preferential growth of one type of terrace occurs, leading to the formation of a single‐domain surface. During continued growth both step flow and nucleation of islands occur. Disordered areas can block the step flow and antiphase disorder offers preferential nucleation sites.