SURFACE-ROUGHNESS OF THIN-FILMS

This paper describes statistical models of the formation of surface mi crorelief on thin films that grow by the island mechanism. The most im portant quantitative characteristics of the growth surface of the film (the autocorrelation function and the roughness spectrum and paramete rs) are derived on the basis of these models, and their relationship w ith the film-growth conditions is determined. It is shown that the the oretical models give a good description of the experimental data on th e roughness of thin films.