The nano-world of thin films

Thin-film morphology-its origin at the atomic level and its evolution-has a long and rich history dating to the very first papers on thin-film deposition in the mid-1800s. I have traced this literature for films prepared under low adatom-mobility conditions and collected my thoughts on the efforts and the current status toward morphology quantification. An atomistic model of evolutionary thin film morphology, based upon atomic clustering at the nm-level, atomic self-shadowing, and competition for columnar growth, forms the backbone for these quantitative approaches. The connection between the science of morphology modeling and the technology of practical thin-film development is exemplified by research on sculptured thin films.