Island nucleation in a reactive two-component system.
The flux and temperature dependence of titanium silicide islands formed by reactive deposition near 500 degrees C indicate a critical nucleus containing 2 Ti atoms and a single activation energy of E(d) + 1/2E(2) = 1.4 +/- 0.2 eV, where E(d) and E(2) are the surface diffusion and cluster binding energies, respectively. These values are not consistent with STM observations of Ti dimer-vacancy hopping at lower temperatures and show that silicide island nucleation involves a different, highly mobile Ti species.
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