Volmer—Weber growth mode

In practice, uniform films are obtained for only a limited number of film-substrate material combinations (17). The more common experience is that the deposited material forms 3D clusters. The clusters may form directly on the bare substrate, in the Volmer-Weber growth mode, or on top of a very thin but uniform film of the deposit, the Stranski-Krastanov growth mode. We now discuss a method for determining the equilibrium configuration of the deposited material. 

The first in situ STM study of metal deposition was for Ag on HOPG [430], which is representative of the Volmer-Weber growth mode. Since that time several other studies of metal deposition on HOPG have been reported Ag [393,431-433], Pb [129], Pt [434,435], Au [436], and Ni [437]. In these studies examining the small metal particles proved to be... 

This is an intermediate combination of the two growth modes mentioned above. The substrate is first covered with one or a few monolayers grown in Frank-van der Merwe mode, then some three-dimensional islands are formed on the surface in the Volmer-Weber growth mode. This mode is a transition from two-dimensional growth to three-dimensional growth and has been observed in metal-metal and metal-semiconductor systems. 

In the case of weak vertical Me-S interaction, only 3D Me cluster formation takes place in the OPD range according to the Volmer-Weber growth mode (Fig. 3(a)), as foimd experimentally in the system highly oriented pyrolytic graphite HOPG(0001)/Ag [14]. 

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