Lattice strain and tilt mapping in stressed Ge microstructures using X-ray Laue micro-diffraction and rainbow-filtering

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates the use of advanced X-ray Laue micro-diffraction techniques to accurately map full strain tensors and lattice orientations in highly stressed germanium microstructures, validated by numerical simulations.

Contribution

It introduces a numerical method to derive the full strain tensor from deviatoric strain measurements, enabling faster strain mapping in micro-devices.

Findings

Excellent agreement between measurements and simulations.

Effective full strain mapping in highly strained microstructures.

Validation of Laue micro-diffraction for micro-device analysis.

Abstract

Micro-Laue diffraction and simultaneous rainbow-filtered micro-diffraction were used to measure accurately the full strain tensor and the lattice orientation distribution at the sub-micron scale in highly strained, suspended Ge micro-devices. A numerical approach to obtain the full strain tensor from the deviatoric strain measurement alone is also demonstrated and used for faster full strain mapping. We performed the measurements in a series of micro-devices under either uniaxial or biaxial stress and found an excellent agreement with numerical simulations. This shows the superior potential of Laue micro-diffraction for the investigation of highly strained micro-devices.