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In all crystal growth, thermodynamic and kinetic influences compete. The crystal morphology reflects this competition. In the growth of thin films, modern techniques, in particular scanning tunneling microscopy (STM), can be used to investigate quantitatively microscopic mechanisms that control the growth, by straightforward analysis of the evolving morphology. A brief review of the application of STM for this purpose is given.
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M. G. Lagally (1993) studied this question.
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