In Situ Measurement of Stress. Included During Annealing, in A1-2%Cu Thin Films

1985 ◽  
Vol 47 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. H. Townsend ◽  
H. A. Vander Plas

ABSTRACTStress measurement in thin film systems is discussed and applied to Al-2%Cu filns on SiO2/Si substrates during thermal cycling. Plastic deformation obscrved during compressive stress relaxation is correlated with the formation of hillocks on the metal films. The effect of secondary layers of 10%Ti-90%W on the thermo-mcchanical response of Al films is examined.

2006 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 505-511 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lili Hu ◽  
Junlan Wang ◽  
Zijian Li ◽  
Shuang Li ◽  
Yushan Yan

Nanoporous silica zeolite thin films are promising candidates for future generation low-dielectric constant (low-k) materials. During the integration with metal interconnects, residual stresses resulting from the packaging processes may cause the low-k thin films to fracture or delaminate from the substrates. To achieve high-quality low-k zeolite thin films, it is important to carefully evaluate their adhesion performance. In this paper, a previously reported laser spallation technique is modified to investigate the interfacial adhesion of zeolite thin film-Si substrate interfaces fabricated using three different methods: spin-on, seeded growth, and in situ growth. The experimental results reported here show that seeded growth generates films with the highest measured adhesion strength (801 ± 68 MPa), followed by the in situ growth (324 ± 17 MPa), then by the spin-on (111 ± 29 MPa). The influence of the deposition method on film–substrate adhesion is discussed. This is the first time that the interfacial strength of zeolite thin films-Si substrates has been quantitatively evaluated. This paper is of great significance for the future applications of low-k zeolite thin film materials.


1991 ◽  
Vol 239 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Mutscheller ◽  
L. A. Clevenger ◽  
J.M.E. Harper ◽  
C. Cabrai ◽  
K. Barmakt

AbstractWe demonstrate that the high temperature polymorphic tantalum phase transition from the tetragonal beta phase to the cubic alpha phase causes complete stress relaxation and a large decrease in the resistance of tantalum thin films. 100 nm beta tantalum thin films were deposited onto thermally oxidized <100> silicon wafers by dc magnetron sputtering with argon. In situ stress and resistance at temperature were measured during temperature-ramped annealing in purified He. Upon heating, films that were initially compressively stressed showed increasing compressive stress due to thermo-elastic deformation from 25 to 550°C, slight stress relief due to plastic deformation from 550 to 700°C and complete stress relief due to the beta to alpha phase transformation at approximately 700–800°C. Incomplete compressive stress relaxation was observed at high temperatures if the film was initially deposited in the alpha phase or if the beta phase did not completely transform into alpha by 800°C. This incomplete beta to alpha phase transition was most commonly observed on samples that had radio frequency substrate bias greater than -100 V. We conclude that the main stress relief mechanism for tantalum thin films is the beta to alpha phase transformation that occurs at 700 to 800°C.


1997 ◽  
Vol 476 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei-Tsu Tseng ◽  
Li-Wen Chen ◽  
G.-C. Tu

AbstractVariations in stress and grain size of Ti- and TiN- capped Al thin films passivated by fluorinated silicon dioxide (SiOF) during repetitive thermal cycling are investigated. The amount of stress relaxation, elastic and plastic behavior of these thin film structures are compared. Ti and TiN cap layers strengthen the single Al film significantly while the presence of SiOF induces plastic deformation of metal layers. Less grain growth is associated with a dielectric passivated Al film. The penetration of fluorine into Al upon annealing can be reduced by a TiN barrier layer.


1995 ◽  
Vol 410 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Bertran ◽  
A. Canillas ◽  
J. Campmany ◽  
M. El Kasmi ◽  
E. Pascual ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTWe present an in situ study of the growth of boron nitride thin films by real time ellipsometry. Films were produced in a PECVD reactor by rf glow discharge decomposition of ammonia (pure) and diborane (1% in hydrogen), on Ni-Cr coated c-Si substrates placed either on the powered electrode or on the grounded electrode of the reactor. A fast phase-modulated ellipsometer performed the real time monitoring of the growth processes at 350 nm. The ellipsometric angle trayectories were obtained through an autocalibrated method, especially suitable for the in situ optical analysis of transparent thin films. We applied several thin film growth optical models (homogeneous, two-layer, surface roughness) to analyze parameters of the films such as refractive index, extinction coefficient, roughness and deposition rate. In all the cases studied, the two-layer model fits well with the ellipsometric measurements, but a more sofisticated model considering a variable refractive index could better describe these films.


Author(s):  
K. Barmak

Generally, processing of thin films involves several annealing steps in addition to the deposition step. During the annealing steps, diffusion, transformations and reactions take place. In this paper, examples of the use of TEM and AEM for ex situ and in situ studies of reactions and phase transformations in thin films will be presented.The ex situ studies were carried out on Nb/Al multilayer thin films annealed to different stages of reaction. Figure 1 shows a multilayer with dNb = 383 and dAl = 117 nm annealed at 750°C for 4 hours. As can be seen in the micrograph, there are four phases, Nb/Nb3-xAl/Nb2-xAl/NbAl3, present in the film at this stage of the reaction. The composition of each of the four regions marked 1-4 was obtained by EDX analysis. The absolute concentration in each region could not be determined due to the lack of thickness and geometry parameters that were required to make the necessary absorption and fluorescence corrections.


Coatings ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 23
Author(s):  
Weiguang Zhang ◽  
Jijun Li ◽  
Yongming Xing ◽  
Xiaomeng Nie ◽  
Fengchao Lang ◽  
...  

SiO2 thin films are widely used in micro-electro-mechanical systems, integrated circuits and optical thin film devices. Tremendous efforts have been devoted to studying the preparation technology and optical properties of SiO2 thin films, but little attention has been paid to their mechanical properties. Herein, the surface morphology of the 500-nm-thick, 1000-nm-thick and 2000-nm-thick SiO2 thin films on the Si substrates was observed by atomic force microscopy. The hardnesses of the three SiO2 thin films with different thicknesses were investigated by nanoindentation technique, and the dependence of the hardness of the SiO2 thin film with its thickness was analyzed. The results showed that the average grain size of SiO2 thin film increased with increasing film thickness. For the three SiO2 thin films with different thicknesses, the same relative penetration depth range of ~0.4–0.5 existed, above which the intrinsic hardness without substrate influence can be determined. The average intrinsic hardness of the SiO2 thin film decreased with the increasing film thickness and average grain size, which showed the similar trend with the Hall-Petch type relationship.


2006 ◽  
Vol 326-328 ◽  
pp. 689-692
Author(s):  
Seung Jae Moon

The thermal conductivity of amorphous silicon (a-Si) thin films is determined by using the non-intrusive, in-situ optical transmission measurement. The thermal conductivity of a-Si is a key parameter in understanding the mechanism of the recrystallization of polysilicon (p-Si) during the laser annealing process to fabricate the thin film transistors with uniform characteristics which are used as switches in the active matrix liquid crystal displays. Since it is well known that the physical properties are dependent on the process parameters of the thin film deposition process, the thermal conductivity should be measured. The temperature dependence of the film complex refractive index is determined by spectroscopic ellipsometry. A nanosecond KrF excimer laser at the wavelength of 248 nm is used to raise the temperature of the thin films without melting of the thin film. In-situ transmission signal is obtained during the heating process. The acquired transmission signal is fitted with predictions obtained by coupling conductive heat transfer with multi-layer thin film optics in the optical transmission measurement.


MRS Advances ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (37) ◽  
pp. 2635-2640 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adele Moatti ◽  
Reza Bayati ◽  
Srinivasa Rao Singamaneni ◽  
Jagdish Narayan

ABSTRACTBi-epitaxial VO2 thin films with [011] out-of-plane orientation were integrated with Si(100) substrates through TiO2/TiN buffer layers. At the first step, TiN is grown epitaxially on Si(100), where a cube-on-cube epitaxy is achieved. Then, TiN was oxidized in-situ ending up having epitaxial r-TiO2. Finally, VO2 was deposited on top of TiO2. The alignment across the interfaces was stablished as VO2(011)║TiO2(110)║TiN(100)║Si(100) and VO2(110) /VO2(010)║TiO2(011)║TiN(112)║Si(112). The inter-planar spacing of VO2(010) and TiO2(011) equal to 2.26 and 2.50 Å, respectively. This results in a 9.78% tensile misfit strain in VO2(010) lattice which relaxes through 9/10 alteration domains with a frequency factor of 0.5, according to the domain matching epitaxy paradigm. Also, the inter-planar spacing of VO2(011) and TiO2(011) equals to 3.19 and 2.50 Å, respectively. This results in a 27.6% compressive misfit strain in VO2(011) lattice which relaxes through 3/4 alteration domains with a frequency factor of 0.57. We studied semiconductor to metal transition characteristics of VO2/TiO2/TiN/Si heterostructures and established a correlation between intrinsic defects and magnetic properties.


1998 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
pp. 1266-1270 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ai-Li Ding ◽  
Wei-Gen Luo ◽  
P. S. Qiu ◽  
J. W. Feng ◽  
R. T. Zhang

PLT(28) thin films deposited on glass substrates were studied by two sputtering processes. One is an in situ magnetron sputtering and the other is a low-temperature magnetron sputtering. The sintered PLT ceramic powders are used as a sputtering target for both processes. The influences of sputtering and annealing conditions on structure and crystallinity of the films were investigated. The electro-optic (E-O) properties of PLT(28) thin films prepared by the two processes were determined by a technique according to Faraday effect. The researches showed the E-O properties were strongly affected by the sputtering process. The film with larger grains exhibits stronger E-O effect. The quadratic E-O coefficient of PLT(28) thin film varies in the range of 0.1 × 10−16 to 1.0 × 10−16 (m/v)2.


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