The dependence of vertical growth rate on surface supersaturation in GaAs(001) microchannel epitaxy (MCE) is studied.
The surface supersaturation is estimated by the fitting of a spiral step on the grown layer.
The screw-like steps at stacking faults (SFs) are also employed to estimate the surface supersaturation.
2D nucleation at SFs was found to act as a strong step source.
An MCE layer with a large aspect ratio can be reproducibly obtained using appropriately controlled surface supersaturation.