Articles you may be interested inVacancy reactions near the interface between electroplated Cu and barrier metal layers studied by monoenergetic positron beams Room-temperature microstructural evolution of electroplated Cu studied by focused ion beam and positron annihilation lifetime spectroscopy Defects introduced into electroplated Cu films during room-temperature recrystallization probed by a monoenergetic positron beam J. Appl. Phys. 98, 043504 (2005); 10.1063/1.2009813 Vacancy-type defects in electroplated Cu films probed by using a monoenergetic positron beam J. Appl. Phys. 95, 913 (2004);Abstract. Positron annihilation was used to evaluate vacancy concentrations in electroplated Cu films with different kinds of electrolytes. The influence of various electrolytes on the impurities, grain boundaries, and micro-voids were also investigated. We found a higher impurity concentration and larger micro-voids were observed in copper films with higher vacancy concentrations. We reduced the failure rate in our stress migration results using a copper film with a higher concentration of vacancy and impurity. The stress migration performance improved because impurity nucleated vacancy clusters act as effective traps for diffusing vacancies.

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The p-type semiconductor CuO has attracted increasing attention as the light-absorbing layer in photovoltaic devices, due to the bandgap energy appropriate to the application. This paper reports the preparation of the (002)-oriented and excellent photoactive CuO films prepared by electrodeposition in a basic aqueous solution followed by annealing. The annealing under optimized condition gave the improvement of both the crystallinity and photoactivity including the response and photocurrent density. The annealed CuO film is a potential candidate as the light absorbing layer of next generation thin film photovoltaic devices.