Evolution of the morphology of annealed, bulk mgo (100) substrate surfaces

A study employing atomic force microscopy of the MgO (100) surface with increasing annealing time is presented. This study is aimed both at the characterisation and understanding of the atomistic processes prevalent in the formation of the observed surface morphologies; results indicate that it is possible to custom-engineer different substrate types to analyse and separate film growth dependencies on step number density and height. The first stage in the evolution of the surface morphology is seen to be extremely rapid, followed by a very much more gradual evolution towards exceedingly flat substrates. Simulations of surface recovery during annealing, employing a Solid-on-Solid model, are in good agreement with these observations.