The use of in situ stress monitoring revealed that the strain relaxation rate of InxGa1–xAs/GaAs thin films was significantly enhanced (over 20 times faster at 500C) by the presence of a growth flux. This effect was by using a model in which the energy for dislocation single kink nucleation was lowered in the presence of an adatom supersaturation. Additional measurements showed that the growth-rate dependence of this enhancement agreed well with the model.

Enhanced Strain Relaxation Rate of InGaAs by Adatom-Assisted Dislocation Kink Nucleation. C.Lynch, E.Chason, R.Beresford: Journal of Vacuum Science & Technology B, 2005, 23[3], 1166-70