Investigating Residual Stress and Cracking Limits in Thick Silicon Nitride for Scalable Photonic Integrated Circuits

Silicon nitride (SiN) enables low-loss, high-index-contrast photonic devices, but its thick-film integration is limited by stress-induced cracking. By combining atomistic simulations with experimental validation, we uncover how composition and process conditions govern mechanical stability-enabling the design of crack-resistant, high-yield SiN platforms for next-generation photonic devices.