Epitaxy is growth of a crystalline layer with an orientation relationship to a crystalline substrate. Homoepitaxy uses the same material; heteroepitaxy uses a different one. A substrate can guide atomic ordering, but a mismatch of lattice parameters introduces strain and can eventually produce misfit dislocations. Thus an apparently flat film need not be strain-free or defect-free. Molecular beam epitaxy controls incident material fluxes in vacuum, while other epitaxial methods use reactive vapors or liquids. The orientation relationship, layer thickness and strain state are distinct parts of the description.
Epitaxy is a process used in material science and semiconductor manufacturing where a thin layer of crystalline material is grown on a substrate of a different material. The key characteristic of epitaxy is that the new layer, or epitaxial layer, is crystallographically aligned with the underlying substrate. This alignment is critical for applications in electronics and optics, as it can influence the electrical, optical, and mechanical properties of the resulting material.
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