Electromigration failure

Abstract

Electromigration failure is modeled as a nucleation and growth process, where void nucleation is due to the generation of a nonequilibrium vacancy concentration from an electromigration induced mass flux divergence. Following nucleation, voids grow until equaling the width of the conductor, causing an open circuit. It is seen that if the failure process is dominated by the nucleation stage, a j-2 dependence on lifetime is observed. In this model, electromigration lifetimes are predicted without resort to adjustable parameters with reasonable accuracy.