“…32 In our case, the annealing temperature was 550 C, so that strong Ga atoms surface diffusion is expected. Meanwhile, it has been reported that (1) Au may attract a large amount of Ga even at 250 C, 33 and (2) the maximum diffusion length of Ga atoms on GaAs {111} B surface has been estimated at 5 lm at 500 C, 34 so that a significant amount of Ga atoms can be attracted towards to the Au nanoparticles at the annealing temperature of 550 C. It should be noted that, in our study, the Au was deposited on the GaAs buffer layer within the MBE system, the surface of GaAs buffer layer must be clear from possible oxidation, which makes the surface diffusion of Ga atoms much easier. To address the …”