Effect of Defects on the Grain and Grain Boundary Strength in Polycrystalline Copper Thin Films

In this study, grain boundary quality in terms of order of atomic arrangement of electroplated copper thin films was evaluated by using the IQ (Image Quality) value obtained from an electron back-scatter diffraction (EBSD) method, and the grain and grain boundary strength was evaluated by applying micro tensile test. In addition, in order to investigate the relationship between the strength and grain boundary quality, molecular dynamics (MD) simulations were applied to analyze the deformation behavior of a bicrystal sample and its strength. The variation of the strength and deformation property were attributed to the higher defect density around grain boundaries than that in grains, which impeded the development of slip systems.