Equilibrium and dynamics of strained islands.

We focus in this work on the effect of the surface energy anisotropy on an elastically strained semiconductor film and in particular on its role on the coarsening dynamics of elastically strained islands. To study the dynamics of a strained film, we establish a one-dimensional nonlinear and nonlocal partial differential equation which takes into account the elastic, capillary, wetting, and anisotropic effects. We first construct an approximate stationary solution of our model using a variational method and an appropriate ansatz.

Shape and coarsening dynamics of strained islands.

We investigate the formation and the coarsening dynamics of islands in a strained epitaxial semiconductor film. These islands are commonly observed in thin films undergoing a morphological instability due to the presence of the elastocapillary effect. We first describe both analytically and numerically the formation of an equilibrium island using a two-dimensional continuous model.