The grant explores to advance understanding of electromigration in copper-based conductor lines similar to those used in advanced integrated circuits through studies based on x-ray microbeam diffraction and fluorescence and other experimental techniques, together with microstructure-dependent, grain scale models, and numerical simulations. The objective of the study is to investigate the role of interface and grain boundary structure, composition, grain orientations, and strain in electromigration. The aim is to examine if the phenomenological descriptions of electromigration, which have been widely applied to electromigration in Al-based conductor lines, are also valid for electromigration in Cu-based conductor lines. Along with exploring the role of impurities in electromigration for Cu-based conductor lines, the research includes detailed, three-dimensional models at the grain scale to test model assumptions by comparison with experimental results. In addition, the relevance will be examined of currently available ab initio calculations of Z* to electromigration phenomena which are now experimentally accessible in Cu-based conductor lines.
The research results are applicable to advanced microelectronic packaging utilizing Cu-interconnects. Through cooperation between research groups at Lehigh University and at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and through contacts with various collaborators at IBM and at Oak Ridge, Brookhaven, and Argonne National Laboratories, graduate students will gain experience with theoretical and experimental methods used in studying electromigration, and they will learn to work in university, industrial, and government laboratory environments. Undergraduates will participate through a research option course at Lehigh for seniors who are considering graduate studies, a computational methods course at RPI, and as summer interns at Lehigh and RPI.
The grant explores to advance understanding of electromigration in copper-based conductor lines similar to those used in advanced integrated circuits through studies based on x-ray microbeam diffraction and fluorescence and other experimental techniques, together with microstructure-dependent, grain scale models, and numerical simulations. The objective of the study is to investigate the role of interface and grain boundary structure, composition, grain orientations, and strain in electromigration. The aim is to examine if the phenomenological descriptions of electromigration, which have been widely applied to electromigration in Al-based conductor lines, are also valid for electromigration in Cu-based conductor lines. Along with exploring the role of impurities in electromigration for Cu-based conductor lines, the research includes detailed, three-dimensional models at the grain scale to test model assumptions by comparison with experimental results. In addition, the relevance will be examined of currently available ab initio calculations of Z* to electromigration phenomena which are now experimentally accessible in Cu-based conductor lines.
The research results are applicable to advanced microelectronic packaging utilizing Cu-interconnects. Through cooperation between research groups at Lehigh University and at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and through contacts with various collaborators at IBM and at Oak Ridge, Brookhaven, and Argonne National Laboratories, graduate students will gain experience with theoretical and experimental methods used in studying electromigration, and they will learn to work in university, industrial, and government laboratory environments. Undergraduates will participate through a research option course at Lehigh for seniors who are considering graduate studies, a computational methods course at RPI, and as summer interns at Lehigh and RPI. ***
