High Precision Young’s Modulus Extraction of Thin Films Through Measuring the Electric-Circuit Behavior of Microstructures
This paper is aimed at developing a high precision algorithm for extracting the Young’s modulus of thin films through the capacitance-voltage measurement of microstructures at wafer level. Two flat micro cantilever beams made of single crystalline silicon are demonstrated. The average value of extracted Young’s modulus in (110) crystalline plane by the present methodology is about 169 GPa, compared to the well-defined value of 168 GPa, the error percentage is within 1% and the high precision and repeatability of the present methodology are verified. Since the driving and measuring signals of the present methodology are both electric, they could be accomplished using existing semiconductor testing equipments through probing on the bonding pads of devices. Because hardware replacement could be avoided, the present methodology shows substantial advantage over other property-extraction methods for large-scale implementation in semiconductor or MEMS fabs.