Download simulation of epitaxial growth and formation of interfacial

Mechanical Behaviour of Systems at Small Length Scales
SIMULATION OF EPITAXIAL GROWTH AND FORMATION OF INTERFACIAL
DISLOCATIONS BY FINITE ELEMENT METHOD
Amit Walavekar, Rajib Chandra Das, Puneet Mahajan and Anandh Subramaniam*
Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi 110016, India
Abstract
This work pertains to finite element analysis of the stress-state in epitaxial thin films
as a function of the thickness and the release of the elastic energy by the nucleation of
interfacial dislocations. In this work, the film and the substrate will be treated as continua.
The initial mesh configuration will consist of a substrate of a semiconductor or metallic
material over which successive layers of another metal or semiconductor are built
numerically. This is done by imposing the coherency at the interface through a lattice misfit
strain (stress free Eshelby strain). This simulation is repeated for successive build-up of the
layers to simulate the growth of the film. Independently the stress state of an edge dislocation
will be simulated by Finite element method. A combined simulation will be used to calculate
the equilibrium critical thickness for the nucleation of a dislocation. Commercially available
packages will be used for the simulations.
Key words: Epitaxial thin films; Critical thickness; Finite element method
* Presenting Author