Abstract
Electronic transition is shown to be important to elemental dynamics of epitaxy, as well as the kinetic mass transport by heat. Thermal desorption flux of In adatom at the InAs surface is consistently explained on the basis of phonon-stimulated electronic transition of the adatom charge state by electron tunneling. This strongly suggests that the thermal desorption is essentially electronic in nature. The effectiveness of the low-temperature scanning tunneling microscope (LT-STM) characterization in combination with the molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) system of III-V semiconductors is discussed. This instrument allows us to clarify fundamental microscopic dynamics during crystal growth induced by electronic processes with enhanced visibility of quantum mechanics of electrons and atoms. The equivalence of electrons and phonons as excitation sources in the case of the electronic transition is verified. Due to this equivalency, it is shown that the LT-STM equipped with the MBE system is a promising complement to in situ observation during MBE.
