Title: Stress effects on solid-state dewetting of nano-thin films

Authors: F. Cheynis; E. Bussmann; F. Leroy; T. Passanante; P. Müller

Addresses: Centre Interdisciplinaire de Nanoscience de Marseille, CNRS UPR 3118, Associated to Aix-Marseille Université, Campus de Luminy, case 913, F-13288, Marseille cedex 9, France. ' Centre Interdisciplinaire de Nanoscience de Marseille, CNRS UPR 3118, Associated to Aix-Marseille Université, Campus de Luminy, case 913, F-13288, Marseille cedex 9, France. ' Centre Interdisciplinaire de Nanoscience de Marseille, CNRS UPR 3118, Associated to Aix-Marseille Université, Campus de Luminy, case 913, F-13288, Marseille cedex 9, France. ' Centre Interdisciplinaire de Nanoscience de Marseille, CNRS UPR 3118, Associated to Aix-Marseille Université, Campus de Luminy, case 913, F-13288, Marseille cedex 9, France. ' Centre Interdisciplinaire de Nanoscience de Marseille, CNRS UPR 3118, Associated to Aix-Marseille Université, Campus de Luminy, case 913, F-13288, Marseille cedex 9, France

Abstract: In this paper, we present a brief survey of stress effects on dewetting. For this purpose, i) we develop a simple thermodynamic model to illustrate stress effects; ii) we study stress effects in strained-Silicon-On-Insulator (s-SOI) thin films by means of Low Energy Electron Microscopy, and Atomic Force Microscopy; iii) we discuss some available data. In particular, we show that while for s-SOI the strain only provides a relatively small contribution to the total driving force for dewetting, in some other cases stress can really dominate the driving force for the dewetting.

Keywords: solid-state dewetting; nanothin films; strain; stress; SOI; thin films; nanotechnology; silicon-on-insulator.

DOI: 10.1504/IJNT.2012.045344

International Journal of Nanotechnology, 2012 Vol.9 No.3/4/5/6/7, pp.396 - 411

Published online: 06 Feb 2012 *

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