Residual stress development and effect on the piezoelectric performance of sol-gel derived lead zirconate titanate (PZT) thin films.

Ferroelectric thin films have higher energy densities, larger strain capabilities and more rapid response times than their bulk counterparts. Typical applications include micro-actuators, micro-sensors and ultrasonic motors for MEMs applications, as well as, nonvolatile computer memories and switching capacitors for integrated circuitry. The electro-mechanical performance of ceramic thin films is greatly influenced by many factors, including grain size, orientation, film thickness, and residual stress level. Residual stresses which arise during the various processing phases of thin film manufacturing can be quite high due to substantial mismatches in substrate-film thermal properties, intrinsic sources (such as grain boundary interactions, etc.), and other external factors. This dissertation examines the relationship between field-induced displacement response and residual stress level for lead zirconate-titanate (PZT) thin films. The film piezoelectric properties are characterized via interferometric measurements for two different loading cases, while the residual stress is determined experimentally from wafer curvature measurements. Additionally two patterning methods, traditional chemical wet-etching and a novel soft lithographic technique, are explored as a means to reduce residual stress within film features. For the soft lithographic technique, film features are created by selective film cracking, a result of poor substrate adhesion promoted by a mediated, self-assembled monolayer. Wafer curvature stress measurements and DIC-based strain measurements of mediated monolayer patterned features reveal that the in-plane stress/strain development is reduced compared to the blanket film case. Critical in-plane strains at crack initiation are also measured using a new digital image correlation technique, in which fluorescent nanoparticles (c.a. 140 nm) provide the speckle pattern. A corresponding increase in the field induced displacements is observed for the film features with reduced residual stress. Overall, the piezoelectric performance of the films is highly dependent on the residual stress in the films and can be enhanced significantly by a reduction in this stress through film patterning.