Post-deposition dynamics of multiple cluster aggregation on liquid surfaces

A comprehensive simulation model---deposition, diffusion, rotation and aggregation---is presented to demonstrate the post-deposition phenomena of multiple cluster growth on liquid surfaces, such as post-deposition nucleation, post-deposition growth and post-deposition coalescence. Emphasis is placed on the relaxations of monomer density, dimer density and cluster density as well as combined cluster-plus-monomer density with time after deposition ending. It is shown that post-deposition coalescence largely takes place after deposition due to the large mobility of clusters on liquid surfaces, while the post-deposition nucleation is only possible before the saturation cluster density is reached at the end of the deposition. The deposition flux and the moment of deposition ending play important roles in the post-deposition dynamics.