Morphologies of an anisotropic diffusion limited growth model to study electroless deposition*

We report results of Monte Carlo simulation of a model which mimics certain aspects of electroless deposition of metals on polymeric surfaces. In the proposed model growth germinates from certain ``active'' particles residing on a flat surface. Further growth occurs via sticking of a diffusing particle while it is within the range of one of these active particles. Once within the attractive range of an ``active'' particle, the motion of the approaching particle is considered ballistic. This newly adsorbed particle then acts as an ``active'' site for further growth and the process continues. We monitor the layer by layer density variation, the pair correlation function and the structure factor as a function of the initial density of the particles and the range of the reaction, and comment on the fractal aspect of the morphology.