Stress and resistivity controls on in situ boron doped LPCVD polysilicon films for high-Q MEMS applications

The simultaneous control of residual stress and resistivity of polysilicon thin films by adjusting the deposition parameters and annealing conditions is studied. In situ boron doped polysilicon thin films deposited at 520 ℃ by low pressure chemical vapor deposition (LPCVD) are amorphous with relatively large compressive residual stress and high resistivity. Annealing the amorphous films in a temperature range of 600-800 ℃ gives polysilicon films nearly zero-stress and relatively low resistivity. The low residual stress and low resistivity make the polysilicon films attractive for potential applications in micro-electro-mechanical-systems (MEMS) devices, especially in high resonance frequency (high-f) and high quality factor (high-Q MEMS resonators. In addition, polysilicon thin films deposited at 570 ℃ and those without the post annealing process have low resistivities of 2-5 mΩ·cm. These reported approaches avoid the high temperature annealing process (> 1000℃), and the promising properties of these films make them suitable for high-Q and high-f MEMS devices.

Stress analysis of silica-based arrayed waveguide grating by a finite element method

The stress distribution in silica optical waveguides on silicon is calculated by using finite element method (FEM). The waveguides are mainly subjected to compressive stress along the x direction and the z direction, and it is accumulated near the interfaces between the core and cladding layers. The shift of central wavelength of silica arrayed waveguide grating (AWG) on silicon-substrate with the designed wavelength and the polarization dependence are caused by the stress in the silica waveguides.

Spin splitting modulated by uniaxial stress in InAs nanowires

We theoretically study the electronic structure, spin splitting, effective mass, and spin orientation of InAs nanowires with cylindrical symmetry in the presence of an external electric field and uniaxial stress. Using an eight-band k center dot p theoretical model, we deduce a formula for the spin splitting in the system, indicating that the spin splitting under uniaxial stress is a nonlinear function of the momentum and the electric field. The spin splitting can be described by a linear Rashba model when the wavevector and the electric field are sufficiently small. Our numeric results show that the uniaxial stress can modulate the spin splitting. With the increase of wavevector, the uniaxial tensile stress first restrains and then amplifies the spin splitting of the lowest electron state compared to the no strain case. The reverse is true under a compression. Moreover, strong spin splitting can be induced by compression when the top of the valence band is close to the bottom of the conductance band, and the spin orientations of the electron stay almost unchanged before the overlap of the two bands.

Universal Biot number determining stress duration and susceptibility of ceramic cylinders to quenching

A universal Biot number, which not only describes the susceptibility of ceramic cylinders to quenching but also determines the duration that ceramic cylinders are subjected to thermal stress during thermal shock, is theoretically obtained. The analysis proves that thermal shock failure of ceramic cylinders with a Biot number greater than the critical value is a rapid process, which only occurs in the initial heat conduction regime. The results provide a guide to the selection of ceramic materials for thermostructural engineering, with particular reference to thermal shock.

A modified criterion for shear band formation in bulk metallic glass under complex stress states

A new criterion for shear band formation in metallic glasses is proposed based on the shear plane criterion proposed by Packard and Schuh [1]. This modified shear plane (MSP) criterion suggests that a shear band is not initiated randomly throughout the entire material under stress but is initiated at the physical boundaries or defects and at locations where the highest normal stress modified maximum shear stress occurs. Moreover, the same as in the shear plan criterion, the shear stress all over the shear band should exceed the shear yield strength of the material. For a complete shear band to form, both requirements need to be fulfilled. The shear yield strength of the material is represented by the shear stress of the point at which the shear band stops. The new criterion agrees very well with experimental results in both the determination of the shear yield strength and the shear band path. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.