Stress, Sheet Resistance, and Microstructure Evolution of Electroplated Cu Films During Self-Annealing

Electroplated copper films are known to change their microstructure due to the self-annealing effect. The self-annealing effect of electroplated copper films was investigated by measuring the time dependence of the film stress and sheet resistance for different layer thicknesses between 1.5 and 20 ??m. While the sheet resistance was found to decrease as time elapsed, a size-dependent change in film stress was observed. Films with the thickness of 5 ??m and below decrease in stress, while thicker films initially reveal an increase in film stress followed by a stress relaxation at a later stage. This behavior is explained by the superposition of grain growth and grain-size-dependent yielding.