Thin-Film Microtensile-Test Structures for High-Throughput Characterization of Mechanical Properties.

A photolithographic process for the rapid fabrication of thin-film tensile-test structures is presented. The process is applicable to various physical vapor deposition techniques and can be used for the combinatorial fabrication of thin-film tensile-test structure materials libraries for the high-throughput characterization of mechanical properties. The functionality of the fabrication process and the feasibility of performing high-quality measurements with these structures are demonstrated with Cu tensile-test structures. In addition, the scalability from unary structures to libraries with compositional variations is demonstrated.