LIMITS ON SURFACE VICINALITY AND GROWTH-RATE DUE TO HOLLOW DISLOCATION CORES ON KDP-(101)

Atomic-force microscopy measurements on KDP {101} faces are presented which show that the terrace width W on vicinal dislocation growth hill ocks is nearly independent of supersaturation sigma and Burgers vector b, in contradiction to simple Burton-Cabrera-Frank models. An analyti cal model taking into account the effect of dislocation cores on step rotation is presented which predicts a dependence of W on sigma and b, in good agreement with the measurements. Using these results, we resc ale macroscopic growth rate data onto a single Arrhenius curve, which gives a value of 0.33 eV for the activation energy of step motion.