Metallurgy Division Publications - NISTIR 6907

Executive Summary

This report describes the major technical activities, accomplishments, and areas of scientific expertise in the Metallurgy Division of the NIST Materials Science and Engineering Laboratory in FY2002 (October 2001 through September 2002). In this report, we have tried to provide insight into how our research programs meet the needs of our customers, how the capabilities of the Metallurgy Division are being used to solve problems important to the national economy and the materials metrology infrastructure, and how we interact with our customers to establish new priorities and programs. We welcome feedback and suggestions on how we can better serve the needs of our customers and encourage increasing collaboration to this end. Mission

Our mission is to provide critical leadership in the development of measurement methods and standards, as well as fundamental understanding of materials behavior needed by U.S. materials users and producers to become or remain competitive in the changing global marketplace. As an essential part of this mission, we are responsible not only for developing new measurement methods with broad applicability across materials classes and industries, but also for working with individual industry groups to develop and integrate measurements, standards, software tools, and evaluated data for specific, technologically important applications.

Establishing Priorities

As part of the development of our technical program, we examine a wide range of research opportunities and make choices for our research portfolio based on several criteria: the match to the NIST mission, the magnitude and immediacy of industrial need, the degree to which NIST's contribution is critical for success, the anticipated impact relative to our investment, our ability to respond in a timely fashion with high-quality output, and the opportunity to advance mission science. This requires that we establish our research priorities through extensive consultation and collaboration with our customers in U.S. industry and with our counterparts in the international metrology community, using a variety of methods including industrial roadmapping activities, workshops, technical meetings, standards committee participation, and individual consultation with our customers.

Within the context of industrial relevance and potential impact of our research, technology trends strongly influence the technical directions addressed by NIST. We prefer to work in rapidly evolving technologies, where advances in measurement science are needed to understand the limitations on system behavior and, therefore, where our contributions are likely to have an impact on the course of technology. For NIST as a whole and the Metallurgy Division in particular, we are committed to having an impact on the measurement and standards infrastructure for the NIST strategic Focus Areas: nanotechnology, health care, homeland security, and information technology/knowledge management. Nanotechnology and information technology/knowledge management are not industry sectors themselves, but are technologies that will have an impact on virtually all present and future industrial enterprises. We have major projects in nanotechnology and homeland security in 2002; additional Division projects will begin in nanotechnology and health care in 2003 and in nanotechnology and information technology/knowledge management in 2004.

Research Portfolio

Our 2002 research portfolio focuses on fulfilling specific measurement needs of the industrial sectors: the magnetic data storage, microelectronics packaging, automotive, aerospace, and optoelectronics industries, and on establishing national traceable hardness standards needed for international trade. Our output consists of a variety of forms, from a fundamental understanding of materials behavior to measurement techniques conveyed through the scientific literature and oral presentations, standard reference materials, evaluated data and online databases, software tools, and sensors for on-line process control.

Magnetic Data Storage: In 2001 we started two new major projects within this program. As part of the National Nanotechnology Initiative, a major collaboration among MSEL, the Information Technology Laboratory (ITL), and the Electronics and Electrical Engineering Laboratory (EEEL) is developing new measurement methods and models for magnetic damping, needed by the magnetic recording industry in the next 3 to 5 years to improve switching speed. Significant progress has been made in 2002 in modeling and measuring fundamental damping mechanisms through ferromagnetic resonance measurements. In 2002, our long-term project on GMR thin films was refocused into Spintronics, the use of spin-polarized electrons for new devices and magnetic imaging. Through an extensive network of university and industrial collaborators, we are using the process measurement and control capabilities of the MSEL Magnetic Engineering Research Facility to develop an understanding of the materials structure and processing issues in the creation and transfer of spin-polarized electrons.

Microelectronics Packaging: In the MSEL Program on Materials for Microelectronics, we are providing tools for producing improved metal interconnects, from copper on-chip interconnects at the nanometer scale to lead-free solder joints on printed wiring boards. Our project on measurements and modeling of electrodeposited copper for nanometer scale chip interconnection technology continues to produce significant value to the microelectronics community. In the three years since beginning the project, we have developed a measurement technique, a theory for control of interface dynamics, and modeling software for predicting quantitatively the ability of complex electrolytes to fill vias and trenches for on-chip interconnects, and have transferred all of these to the appropriate industrial customers. During the last year, we have demonstrated, in collaboration with International Sematech and Motorola, the generality and versatility of the NIST theory for electrodeposited metals other than copper, and for chemical vapor deposition. In the area of electronics assembly, we continue to play a major role in the NEMI Lead-Free Solder Task Force, with the goal of preparing the U.S. microelectronics industry to assemble products with lead-free solders as required for international trade. In FY2002, the NEMI Lead-free Task Force and NIST have worked together to respond to the needs for critically evaluated data for modeling the reliability of lead-free solder alloys.

Automotive: Within the expanding program on the Forming of Lightweight Materials, we are developing standard test methods for sheet metal forming, measurements of surface roughness, and physically based constitutive laws - and measurement tools needed to reveal them. In FY2002, we have made a major breakthrough in bridging the length scale between dislocation level modeling and macroscopic deformation. This statistical physics approach to propagation of dislocations through dislocation cell walls, and the local accumulation of deformation till slip bands form provides the underpinning for developing physically-based constitutive laws as a function of alloy composition. All of our projects in the Forming of Lightweight Materials Program are done in close collaboration with the automotive industry through formal partnerships, such as USCAR and the Freedom Car, and are designed to help accelerate the design of forming operations for lightweight materials such as aluminum that will ultimately improve fuel economy.

Aerospace and Power Generation: Within the Metals Processing Program, we continue to help U.S. aerospace and power generation industries improve responsiveness and competitiveness by accelerating the design of manufacturing processes for turbine engines. Our development of composition-dependent diffusion mobility databases for superalloy systems provides an efficient method to store a wealth of diffusion data and the means to extrapolate the available data to higher order systems of importance to these industries. NIST collaborates on a DARPA project with General Electric and Howmet Corporation using this approach to accelerate process development for the Ni-Al-Cr-Co-Fe-Hf-Mo-Nb-Re-Ta-Ti-W system.

Optoelectronics: As a result of a growing collaboration between EEEL and MSEL, a Program on Wide Band Gap Semiconductors was established at the end of FY2001 and continued through FY2002. Building on the existing projects on metal interconnects for GaN (Metallurgy Division) and on interface and bulk defects in GaN (Ceramics Division), the EEELMSEL program is developing a comprehensive suite of measurement methods for characterizing interface and bulk defects limiting the application of GaN and related materials.

National Hardness Standards: In addition to industry-specific goals, national and international standardization activities are a continuing responsibility. As part of our core NIST mission, we provide national and international leadership in the standardization of Rockwell hardness, the primary test measurement used to determine and specify the mechanical properties of metal products. Our responsibility requires us not only to develop the U.S. national standards with traceability from NIST through NVLAP to secondary standards labs and U.S. metals producers and users, but also to provide leadership to ASTM Standards Committees, the U.S. delegation to ISO, BIPM, and OIML.

Division Structure and Expertise

The Division is composed of 39 scientists, supported by 6 technicians, 6 administrative staff members, and more than 80 guest scientists, and organized into five groups that represent the Division's core expertise in Metallurgical Processing, Electrochemical Processing, Magnetic Materials, Materials Structure and Characterization, and Materials Performance. However, by virtue of the interdisciplinary nature of materials problems in the industrial and metrology sectors that we serve, program teams are assembled across group, division and laboratory boundaries to best meet our project goals. We are committed to assembling the expertise and resources to fulfill our technical goals with the speed and quality necessary to have the desired impact.

Recognition for Division Staff

We are proud of the accomplishments of the Metallurgy Division staff in delivering the measurements, standards, data, and modeling tools needed by our customers. In FY2002, Division members were recognized for the impact and quality of their work by a wide range of organizations, including internally at NIST.

• John Cahn was awarded the 2002 Bower Prize for Achievement in Science for "his unprecedented contributions to the understanding of thermodynamics and kinetics of phase transformations in materials." The award consists of a gold medal and $250,000.

• Daniel Josell, Tom Moffat, and Gery Stafford were awarded the Department of Commerce Gold Medal, the highest honor conferred by the Department, for their pioneering achievements in developing measurement and modeling techniques for controlling copper metallization processes for use in on-chip interconnects. Within two years, they provided the measurement and modeling tools necessary to extend the technology to below 60 nm line width, smaller than the target line width for 2008 according to the 1999 SIA International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors.

• Ursula Kattner was awarded the NIST Bronze Medal and the ASM George Kimball Burgess Memorial Award for her outstanding achievement in thermodynamics and the application of phase diagrams to important industrial metallurgical processes.

• Bill Boettinger became a NIST Fellow, the highest scientific and technical position at NIST.

• Tom Moffat was awarded the William Blum Award from the National Capital Section of the Electrochemical Society for his research on electrodeposition at the nanoscale and his application of this research to on-chip interconnection.

• Bob Shull was elected as a Senior Member of IEEE.

• Ursula Kattner and Albert Davydov were awarded the 2002 Alloy Phase Diagram International Committee (APDIC) Best Paper award for the best critical review of phase diagram data published in the three years preceding the award.

• Steve Banovic was given the Society of Automotive Engineers Best Paper Award for Wrought Aluminum Alloys for his paper on the effect of microstructural variables on surface roughening in aluminum alloys.

• Chris Johnson was given the International Microelectronics and Packaging Society (IMAPS) Best Paper Award with George Harman of ITL for their paper on "Wire Bonding to Advanced Copper-Low-K Integrated Circuit, the Metal/Dielectric Stacks, and Materials Considerations."

• Jonathan Guyer was awarded the Best Poster Award from the Materials Research Society, 2002 Spring Meeting for his poster on stress-induced instabilities in thin films.

• Carol Handwerker was awarded the SolderTek Award for Lead-Free Solders in recognition of her contributions to lead-free soldering technology in the NCMS Lead-Free Solder Project and in the current NEMI Lead-Free Assembly Project.

Carol A. Handwerker
Chief, Metallurgy Division