Polycrystalline films are used in a wide array of microand nano-scale devices, for electronic, mechanical, magnetic, photonic and chemical functions. Increasingly, the properties, performance, and reliability of films in these systems depend on nano-scale structure. In collaborative research with a number of SMA Fellows, Associates, and students, our group is carrying out research focused on pr...

We have used a feedback method to control the electromigration of gold nanowires to form nanogap junctions, similar to recent reports [1, 2]. We have studied gold wires fabricated with conventional electron-beam and photolithography on thick SiO2 and thin Al2O3 (over Al) substrates. We find that the role of feedback mechanism is to control the local temperature of the electromigrating nanowire,...

_______________________________________________________________ vi In order to investigate the cause of early electromigration failure in Cu vias, an infrared (IR) microscope technique was developed to detect weak via before catastrophic failure. The grain structure of a via (grain size and grain orientation) is determined to be not critical to the early failure. Instead, our study shows that p...

Electromigration in the Ni/Sn-Zn/Cu solder interconnect was studied with an average current density of 3.51 9 10 A/cm for 168.5 h at 150 C. When the electrons flowed from the Ni side to the Cu side, uniform layers of Ni5Zn21 and Cu5Zn8 were formed at the Ni/Sn-Zn and Cu/Sn-Zn interfaces. However, upon reversing the current direction, where electron flow was from the Cu side to the Ni side, a th...

Dynamic ligand exchange-affinity capillary electrophoresis (DLE-ACE) is introduced as a convenient platform for assessing the conformational stability and relative affinity of a holoprotein to different ligands without off-line sample pretreatment, since ligand exchange and protein unfolding processes are integrated in-capillary during electromigration.