Adatom diffusion in high electric fields

TL;DR

This paper introduces a Kinetic Monte Carlo model to simulate adatom migration on tungsten surfaces under high electric fields, accurately predicting drift velocities and aligning with experimental data.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel Kinetic Monte Carlo simulation approach for adatom diffusion in electric fields, validated against experimental results.

Findings

Model accurately predicts adatom drift velocities

Excellent agreement with experimental data

Demonstrates electric field influence on adatom migration

Abstract

Strong electric fields are known to create biased adatom migration on metallic surfaces. We present a Kinetic Monte Carlo model that can simulate adatom migration on a tungsten (W) surface in electric fields. We validate our model by using it to calculate the drift velocity of the adatom at different fields and temperature and comparing the results with experimental data from the literature. We obtain excellent agreement.