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Rui Huang's picture

Influence of Interfacial Delamination on Channel Cracking of Brittle Thin Films


H. Mei, Y. Pang, and R. Huang, International Journal of Fracture 148, 331-342 (2007).

Following a previous effort published in MRS Proceedings, we wrote a journal article of the same title, with more numerical results. While the main conclusions stay the same, a few subtle points are noted in this paper.

Nicolas Cordero's picture

Channel cracks in a hermetic coating consisting of organic and inorganic layers

Abstract: Flexible electronic devices often require hermetic coatings that can withstand applied strains. This paper calculates the critical strains for various configurations of channel cracks in a coating consisting of organic and inorganic layers. We show that the coating can sustain the largest strain when the organic layer is of some intermediate thicknesses.

Flexible electronics are promising for diverse applications, such as rollable displays, conformal sensors, and printable solar cells. These systems are thin, rugged, and lightweight. They can be manufactured at low costs, for example, by roll-to-roll printing. The development of flexible electronics has raised many issues concerning the mechanical behavior of materials. This paper examines a particular issue: channel cracks in hermetic coatings.

Electronic devices (e.g., organic light-emitting devices, OLEDs) often degrade when exposed to air. Developing hermetic coatings has been a significant challenge. Organic films are permeable to gases, and inorganic films inevitably contain processing flaws, so that neither by themselves are effective gas barriers. These considerations have led to the development of multilayer coatings consisting of alternating organic and inorganic films. To be used in flexible electronics, these coatings must also withstand applied strains without forming channel cracks...

Jeannette Jacques's picture

Environmental Effects on Crack Characteristics for OSG Interconnect Materials

Jeannette M. Jacques, Ting Y. Tsui, Andrew J. McKerrow, and Robert Kraft

To improve capacitance delay performance of the advanced back-end-of-line (BEOL) structures, low dielectric constant organosilicate glass (OSG) has emerged as the predominant choice for intermetal insulator. The material has a characteristic tensile residual stress and low fracture toughness. A potential failure mechanism for this class of low-k dielectric films is catastrophic fracture due to channel cracking. During fabrication, channel cracks can also form in a time-dependent manner due to exposure to a particular environmental condition, commonly known as stress-corrosion cracking. Within this work, the environmental impacts of pressure, ambient, temperature, solution pH, and solvents upon the channel cracking of OSG thin films are characterized. Storage under high vacuum conditions and exposure to flowing dry nitrogen gas can significantly lower crack propagation rates. Cracking rates experience little fluctuation as a function of solution pH; however, exposure to aqueous solutions can increase the growth rate by three orders of magnitude.

Xiao Hu Liu's picture

Pattern Effect on Low-k Channel Cracking

Low dielectric constant (low-k) is achieved often at the cost of degraded mechanical properties, making it difficult to integrate the dielectric in the back end of line (BEOL) and to package low-k chips. Development of low-k technology becomes costly and time-consuming. Therefore, more frequently than before, people resort to modeling to understand mechanical issues and avoid failures. In this paper we present three multilevel patterned film models to examine channel cracking in low-k BEOL. The effects of copper features, caps and multilevel interconnects are investigated and their implications to BEOL fabrication are discussed.

Low-k BEOL Mechanical Modeling
Liu, Xiao Hu; Lane, Michael W; Shaw, Thomas M; Liniger, Eric G; Rosenberg, Robert R; Edelstein, Daniel C
Advanced Metallization Conference 2004 (AMC 2004); San Diego, CA and Tokyo; USa and Japan; 19-21 Oct. 2004 and 28-29 Sept. 2004. pp. 361-367. 2005

Ting Tsui's picture

Constraint Effects on Thin Film Channel Cracking Behavior

Channel CrackOne of the most common forms of cohesive failure observed in brittle thin film subjected to a tensile residual stress is channel cracking, a fracture mode in which through-film cracks propagate in the film. The crack growth rate depends on intrinsic film properties, residual stress, the presence of reactive species in the environments, and the precise film stack.

Ting Tsui's picture

Channel Crack

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