Gold nanoparticle inks were investigated as a potential candidate for lead-free packaging applications. Inks consisted of surfactant-passivated nanoparticles dissolved in a solvent. Optimized gold inks are able to sinter at temperatures as low as 120°C and achieve conductivities of up to 70% of bulk. Once sintered, the metallic structure reverts to bulk-like properties and approaches bulk reliability and performance. Thus nanoparticle-based solders would operate at much lower homologous temperatures as compared with alloy-based solders. Nanoparticle inks under investigation were sintered at 180°C. The resulting material exhibited a resistivity of 5 μΩ cm, which is significantly lower than those of Pb-Sn and Sn-Ag-Cu. Electromigration studies were carried out and time to failure was investigated as a function of temperature. Electromigration activation energy was calculated through Black’s equation to be 0.52 eV, which is consistent with surface/grain boundary diffusion. These studies suggest that nanoparticle-ink-based films show excellent robustness, due to their irreversible conversion to bulk-like materials. Nanoparticle inks are thus promising candidates for next-generation lead-free solders.
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Acknowledgements
Portions of this work were supported by the National Science Foundation. Mr. Bakhishev is partially supported by an Intel Robert N. Noyce Fellowship in Microelectronics
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Open Access This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0), which permits any noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.
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Bakhishev, T., Subramanian, V. Investigation of Gold Nanoparticle Inks for Low-Temperature Lead-Free Packaging Technology. J. Electron. Mater. 38, 2720–2725 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11664-009-0918-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11664-009-0918-9