Influence of Point Defects on the Initiation of Electromigration in an Impurity Conductor

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

A model of two-component electromigration in a solid-state conductor with a substitutional impurity (an alloy of a type of a substitutional solid solution) is developed. The previously proposed approach to describe this process, using the methods of nonequilibrium thermodynamics, is generalized in this study in order to take into account the internal mechanical stresses arising as a result of mass transfer in the system. The dependence of the critical electromigration length on the effects caused by the interaction (correlation) of the fluxes of the conductor and impurity atoms is investigated. Practically important cases are considered in detail when electromigration processes prevail in the volume of a conductor or in the interface between a conductor and a protective dielectric. The influence of point crystal defects in a dielectric on the critical length of electromigration at the interface is analyzed. Estimates are given of the magnitude of the predicted effects of the influence of substitutional impurities on the electromigration of the intrinsic ions of the conductor. It is shown that, in the case of electromigration at interfaces, the correlational effects of the influence of substitutional impurities (up to the actual blocking of electromigration of conductor atoms) can be controlled by introducing nonequilibrium point defects into the protective dielectric layer.