Mechanical strength of Sn-3.5Ag-based solders and related bondings

The tensile strengths of bulk solders and joint couples of Sn-3.5Ag-0.5Cu, Sn-3.5Ag-0.07Ni, and Sn-3.5Ag-0.5Cu-0.07Ni-0.01Ge solders and the shear strengths of ball grid array (BGA) specimens, solder-ball-attached Cu/Ni/Au metallized substrates were investigated. The tensile strength of the bulk is degraded by thermal aging. The Ni-containing solder exhibits lower tensile strength than Sn-3.5Ag-0.5Cu after thermal aging. However, the Ni-containing solder joints show greater tensile strength than the Cu/Sn-3.5Ag-0.5Cu/Cu joint. Fracture of the solder joint occurs between the intermetallic compound (IMC) and the solder. The shear strength and fracture mechanism of BGA specimens are the same regardless of solder composition.     

Phase transformations in thermally exposed Au-Al ball bonds

Gold-aluminum ball bonds were thermally exposed at constant elevated temperatures, and the resultant phase transformations studied in detail. The as-bonded microstructure of a Au-Al ball bond essentially consisted of a reaction zone (termed “alloyed zone” (AZ) in the as-bonded condition) between the Au bump and the bonded Al metallization. It is the growth of the reaction zone between the Au bump and the bonded Al metallization and also the nonbonded Al metallization during thermal exposure that gave rise to the various phase transformations. Au₄Al, Au₈Al₃, and Au₂Al are the predominant phases that grew across the ball bond until the bonded Al metallization is available to take part in the interdiffusion reactions. After the complete consumption of the bonded Al metallization, the Au-Al phases reverse transformed resulting in the formation of the Au₄Al phase in the entire reaction zone across the ball bond (RZ-A). The lateral interdiffusion reactions resulted in the nucleation and the growth of all of the Au-Al phases given by the phase diagram. Kidson’s analysis and Tu et al.’s treatment were extended to a five-phase binary system to explain the phase transformations in thermally exposed Au-Al ball bonds. It is possible for all of the Au-Al phases to grow across a ball bond uninhibited as long as the bonded metallization is available. However, the supply limitation of the bonded metallization gives rise to reverse transformations where Al-rich phases transform to Au-rich phases and eventually result in the formation of the Au₄Al phase in the entire RZ-A. If infinite time is allowed, Au₄Al would dissolve; the extent of which is dependent on the solubility of Al in Au. No supply of Au lateral to the bond causes the reverse transformation of the Au₄Al phase, giving rise to the lateral growth of the remaining Au-Al phases. If infinite time is allowed, the lateral phase transformations would result in the formation of a phase that is dependant on the relative proportion of Au and Al present in the nonbonded metallization (NBM) and Au₄Al below the void line. Hence, the presence of a phase in a particular location of a ball bond is dependent on the time and temperature of thermal exposure.     

Energy-Efficient Routing for Frequency-Hop Wireless Networks

The use of adaptive-transmission protocols in wireless, store-and-forward, packet communication networks may result in large differences in the energy requirements of the alternative paths that are available to the routing protocol. Routing metrics can provide quantitative measures of the quality and energy efficiency of the paths from the source to the destination. Such measures are required if the routing protocol is to take advantage of the potential energy savings that are made possible by an adaptive-transmission protocol. An energy-efficient protocol suite for routing and adaptive transmission in frequency-hop wireless networks is described and evaluated, several routing metrics are compared, and tradeoffs among energy efficiency, delay, and packet success probability are investigated.     

Herrn O. Univ.-Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Dr. Richard Eier zur Emeritierung

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Transparent flexible plastic substrates for organic light-emitting devices

In this paper, we describe the properties of flexible plastic substrates with a transparent conducting electrode (TCE), which are important for organic light-emitting devices (OLEDs). Specifically, we have evaluated the TCE electrical resistivity, surface roughness, electrode patterning, optical transmission, and the substrate water vapor/oxygen transmission. We have studied the effect of ultraviolet (UV)-ozone treatment on the TCE surface by using contact angle measurements and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). A decrease in the advancing contact angle by 30–40° and an increase of oxygen content on the TCE surface by 10 at.% were observed after the UV-ozone treatment. These changes facilitate the polymer adhesion to the TCE surface and increase the TCE surface work function, respectively. A sheet resistance of 12–13 Ω/□, an optical transmission greater than 80% over the visible range, and a surface roughness of 1.4–2.2-nm RMS over 50×50 μm² have been obtained for the plastic substrates. These properties are adequate for OLED applications based on United States Display Consortium specifications. Finally, we have found that a combination of hydrogenated amorphous silicon-nitride and silicon-oxide layers deposited on one side of the substrate at low-temperature reduces the water vapor and oxygen transmission rates (TRs) to less than 10⁻⁵ g/cm²-day-atm and about 10⁻⁷ cc/cm²-day-atm, respectively.     

NOVEL BIPHASE CODE——INTEGRATED SIDELOBE SUPPRESSION CODE

A kind of novel binary phase code named sidelobe suppression code is proposed in this paper.It is defined to be the code whose corresponding optimal sidelobe suppression filter outputs the minimum sidelobes.It is shown that there do exist sidelobe suppression codes better than the conventional optimal codes-Barker codes.For example,the sidelobe suppression code of length 11 with filter of length 39 has better sidelobe level up to 17dB than that of Barker code with the same code length and filter length.     

Annealing effects of a high-quality ZnTe substrate

The sharp photoluminescence (PL) and optical-reflection spectra in the bandedge region of the high-quality nondoped ZnTe substrate (100) were observed at 4.2 K. Free exciton, associated with lower and upper polaritons (EX^L and EX^U) at 2.382 eV and 2.381 eV, respectively, were clearly observed. This meant that this substrate was high quality. The intensity of a bound exciton peak (2.375 eV), which is caused by a Zn vacancy, of a neutral acceptor decreased with an increase of the Zn vapor pressures.     

Research on Marine Boiler＇s Pressurized Combustion and Heat Transfer

The effect of pressure on combustion and heat transfer is analyzed. The research is based on the basic combustion and heat transfer theorem. A correction for the heat calculation method for pressurized furnace is made on the basis of the normal pressure case. The correction takes the effect of pressurizing into account. The results show that the correction is reasonable and the method is applicable to combustion and heat transfer of the marine supercharged boiler.     

Thermal Radiative Properties of Xonotlite Insulation Material

Introduction Xonotlite-type calcium silicate (6CaO?6SiO2?H2O) is synthesized porous insulation material by hydrothermal processing with quartz powder and limestone as the raw material (with CaO/ SiO2≈1:1). Compared with fire- retardant fibre, xonotlite has more excellent insulating performance, such as low thermal conductivity, environment friendly, high intension, and wide applying temperature range, which has been emphasized in recent years by many scholars and widely used in many indu…     

Optimal Cyclic Exploitation of Renewable Resources

The paper contributes to the topic of optimal utilization of spatially distributed renewable resources. Namely, a problem of “sustainable” optimal cyclic exploitation of a renewable resource with logistic law of recovery is investigated. The resource is distributed on a circle and is collected by a single harvester moving along the circle. The recovering and harvesting rates are position dependent, and the latter depends also on the velocity of the harvester, which is considered as a control. The existence of an optimal solution is proved, as well as necessary optimality conditions for the velocity of the harvester. On this base, a numerical approach is proposed, and some qualitative properties of the optimal solutions are established. The results are illustrated by numerical examples, which reveal some economically meaningful features of the optimal harvesting.