Description / Table of Contents:
Cellular growth is an important crystal growth process and offers an interesting example of natural pattern formation. The present work has been undertaken to study cellular growth, especially its pattern formation, both experimentally and numerically. In situ observations of faceted cellular growth clearly revealed cellular interactions in the array of cells. Cell tip splitting and loss of cells were observed to be the two main mechanisms for the adjustment of cell spacings during growth. For the first time, the true time-dependent faceted cellular growth has been modelled properly. The time evolution of faceted cellular growth has demonstrated the dynamical features of cellular growth processes. It was shown that the pattern formation was determined by cellular interactions in the array, either transient or persistent depending on the growth condition. The cellular structures were irregular when persistent interactions occurred, whereas relatively regular structures could be formed once the transient interactions had stopped. As a result of cellular interactions, a finite range of stable cell spacings was found under a given growth condition. Numerical experiments were carried out for k 〉 1 and k 〈 1 (where k is the solute partition coefficient), under a number of different growth conditions. It was found that these two cases were not symmetric as far as solute distribution is concerned; however the pattern formation behaviours were similar. For k 〉 1 shallow cells were retained, while for k 〈 1, the formation of liquid grooves along the cell boundary depended on the growth condition. The solute effect plays an important role in the cellular interactions in the array. The results were compared with experimental observations in thin film silicon single crystals. It is felt that a general behaviour of pattern formation is found and should be expected for other processes such as non-faceted cellular or eutectic growth. In addition, the solute flow in steady state cellular array growth was studied using the point source technique. Preliminary work was carried out to measure steady state non-faceted cell shapes. Heat flow in zone melting was studied numerically.
Pages:
Online-Ressource (208 Seiten)
ISBN:
9783540544852
URL:
https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0010300
Language:
English
