Monte Carlo simulation on the roughening of vicinal surfaces

We present a Monte Carlo study of the roughening transition on the vicinal Ag(115) surface. The simulations are performed within the framework of the terrace ledge kink (TLK) model. The values for the two energies that serve as input parameters in this model are taken from the scanning tunnelling mi croscopy experiments of Hoogeman et al. [Phys. Rev. B, 53 (1996) R13 299]. From a quantitative analysis of the height correlation function measured fr om the simulated configurations we determine the roughening temperature T-R = 423 +/- 6 K. This roughening temperature is close to the theoretical pre diction of the TLK model and the experimentally obtained T-R. We discuss th e influence of periodic boundary conditions and show that finite-size effec ts on the value of T-R are small. (C) 2000 Published by Elsevier Science B. V. All rights reserved.