Thermo-mechanical behavior of silicon at nanoscale — an in situ investigation
type: CreativeWork
description: Materials at the micrometer and submicrometer scale exhibit mechanical properties that are substantially different from bulk materials. With the increasing miniaturization of devices, accurate characterization of micro/nanoscale materials and fundamental understanding of their deformation mechanism are essential to ensure their reliability and performance. The application of the micro/nano devices are not limited to room temperature as those small devices are often required to operate in high temperature environment. The mechanical properties of micro- and nano-materials are expected to be highly temperature dependent, even more than those of their bulk counterparts. One of such behavior is size dependent brittle-to-ductile transition (BDT) in single crystal silicon (SCS). Several experimental and computational studies suggest that SCS can plastically deform near or even at room temperature with reduction of sample size. However size dependent BDT in SCS is not conclusive as there are controversial experimental results in the literature, i.e., no plastic deformation until brittle failure of a sample irrespective of the sample size. The foremost reason for the relatively limited available data and little understanding of the mechanisms of size dependent BDT is the lack of comprehensive and robust in situ experimental techniques. In particular, there has been no technique to perform in situ deformation experiments in SEM or TEM while simultaneously controlling both the key parameters influencing BDT, namely temperature and specimen size. In this study we have developed novel methods to explore mechanical and thermo-mechanical behavior of micro/nano scale materials with a special emphasis on in situ study. The in situ material testing offers an attractive feature in studying of micro/nano materials as it provides direct structure-property relationship due to ultra high resolution of Electron Microscopy observations. Using this unique in situ measurement ability, we hav…
abstract: Materials at the micrometer and submicrometer scale exhibit mechanical properties that are substantially different from bulk materials. With the increasing miniaturization of devices, accurate characterization of micro/nanoscale materials and fundamental understanding of their deformation mechanism are essential to ensure their reliability and performance. The application of the micro/nano devices are not limited to room temperature as those small devices are often required to operate in high temperature environment. The mechanical properties of micro- and nano-materials are expected to be highly temperature dependent, even more than those of their bulk counterparts. One of such behavior is size dependent brittle-to-ductile transition (BDT) in single crystal silicon (SCS). Several experimental and computational studies suggest that SCS can plastically deform near or even at room temperature with reduction of sample size. However size dependent BDT in SCS is not conclusive as there are controversial experimental results in the literature, i.e., no plastic deformation until brittle failure of a sample irrespective of the sample size. The foremost reason for the relatively limited available data and little understanding of the mechanisms of size dependent BDT is the lack of comprehensive and robust in situ experimental techniques. In particular, there has been no technique to perform in situ deformation experiments in SEM or TEM while simultaneously controlling both the key parameters influencing BDT, namely temperature and specimen size. In this study we have developed novel methods to explore mechanical and thermo-mechanical behavior of micro/nano scale materials with a special emphasis on in situ study. The in situ material testing offers an attractive feature in studying of micro/nano materials as it provides direct structure-property relationship due to ultra high resolution of Electron Microscopy observations. Using this unique in situ measurement ability, we hav…
author: Kang, Won Mo
language: en
keywords: Electron Microscopy, silicon, size effect, brittle-to-ductile transition, stress gradient
date published: 2012-09-18T21:20:41Z
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:25:31Z
provider: University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/2142/34508