Sidewall Adhesion Evolution in Epitaxial Polysilicon as a Function of Impact Kinetic Energy and Stopper Area

This paper investigates the evolution of adhesion forces during dynamic contacts, which simulate realistic shocks. The developed method accounts for the differences in offset, resonance, and quality factor among the devices under test to precisely predict (and monitor) the kinetic impact energy during shocks. The results clearly show that adhesion force grows and stabilizes at an increasing amplitude with the applied impact energy. This dynamic adhesion is also dependent on the contact area, while the native adhesion on the same specimens was independent of it. Finally, a relaxation of the adhesion force with a very long time constant is observed after the end of the tests.