Fracture Properties Characterization of Multi-Layer Ceramic Capacitors for Device Longevity Assessment

Multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCCs) are essential passive elements for circuit boards and could be treated as metal/ceramic laminated structures. Due to thermo-mechanical mismatch and the high temperature experienced during fabrication, considerable stress could be induced. Consequently, structural failures such as delamination between layers or crack propagation in ceramics are frequently reported due to the brittle nature of materials. In this work, essential structural integrity assessment flow for characterizing fracture properties of MLCC are developed and the corresponding fracture properties characterization are conducted after different processing conditions in prior to serve for device longevity design based on indentation techniques. Elastic modulus and hardness, and consequently, the dependence of both fracture toughness and residual stress w.r.t. sintering temperatures are obtained. The results should be useful for optimizing processing parameters such as sintering temperatures and durations for both performance improvement and carbon emission reduction.