• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
• /
• 1999.05a
• /
• pp.708-711
• /
• 1999

The Cu/Ni/Au lamellar structure is extensively used as an under bump metallization on silicon file, and on printed circuit board(PCB) pads. Ni is plated Cu by either electroless Ni plating, or electrolytic Ni plating. Unlike the electrolytic Ni plating, the electroless Ni plating does not deposit pure Ni, but a mixture of Ni and phosphorous, because hypophosphite Is used in the chemical reaction for reducing Ni ions. The fracture crack extended at the interface between solder balls of plastic ball grid (PBGA) package and conducting pads of PCB. The fracture is duets to segregation at the interface between Ni$_3$Sn$_4$intermetallic and Ni-P layer. The XPS diffraction results of Cu/Ni/Au results of CU/Ni/AU finishs showed that the Ni was amorphous with supersaturated P. The XPS and EDXA results of the fracture surface indicated that both of the fracture occurred on the transition lesion where Sn, P and Ni concentrations changed.

• Journal of the Optical Society of Korea
• /
• v.19 no.3
• /
• pp.217-221
• /
• 2015

Developing a metallization that has low cost and high efficiency is essential in solar-cell industries, to replace expensive silver-based metallization. Ni/Cu two-step metallization is one way to reduce the cost of solar cells, because the price of copper is about 100 times less than that of silver. Alkaline electroless plating was used for depositing nickel seed layers on the front electrode area. Prior to the nickel deposition process, 2% HF solution was used to remove native oxide, which disturbs uniform nickel plating. In the subsequent step, a nickel sintering process was carried out in $N_2$ gas atmosphere; however, copper was plated by light-induced plating (LIP). Plated nickel has different properties under different bath conditions because nickel electroless plating is a completely chemical process. In this paper, plating bath conditions such as pH and temperature were varied, and the metal layer's structure was analyzed to investigate the adhesion of Ni/Cu metallization. Average adhesion values in the range of 0.2-0.49 N/mm were achieved for samples with no nickel sintering process.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
• /
• v.24 no.11
• /
• pp.617-624
• /
• 2014

To elucidate the effects of a pretreatment process on the uniformity of Ag electroless plating on Cu flakes, pretreatment time was mainly considered with a mixed solution of 0.15 M ammonium hydroxide and 0.0375 M ammonium sulphate. Optical inspection of Ag-coated Cu flakes determined that the optimal pretreatment time is 120 s. Repetition of the sequence in which Ag plating was done immediately after the pretreatment of 120 s clearly enhanced the plating uniformity. Scanning electron microscopy revealed that holes were formed irregularly on some Cu flakes during the period from the asdropping of an Ag precursor solution to 5 min. The hole formation was judged to be due to continuous removal of Cu on the local surfaces by the repetitive formation and elimination of $Cu_2O$ or $Cu(OH)_2$ layers. However, the increase of the amount of Ag coating suppressed the hole creation and increasingly enhanced the antioxidant property.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
• /
• v.51 no.5
• /
• pp.263-270
• /
• 2018

Ag-coated Cu dendrites were prepared as a filler for an electromagnetic interference shielding application. Ag layers on the Cu dendrites was coated by two approaches. One is a direct autocatalytic plating with a reducing agent. The other approach was achieved by two-step plating, a galvanic displacement reaction to form Ag seed layers on Cu following by an autocatalytic plating with a reducing agent. The procedure-dependent average particle size and tap density of Ag-coated Cu dendrites were characterized. The electrical resistance and electromagnetic interference shielding effect (EMI SE) were analyzed with the Ag-coated Cu dendrites prepared in the two approaches. Additionally, the content of the Ag coated on Cu dendrites was controlled from 2% to 20%. The electrical resistance and EMI SE were critically determined by Ag contents coated on Cu.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
• /
• v.26 no.3
• /
• pp.109-116
• /
• 2016

To achieve the fabrication of high-quality Ag-coated Cu particles through a wet chemical process, we reported herein pretreatment conditions using an ammonium-based mixed solvent for the removal of a $Cu_2O$ layer on Cu particles that were oxidized in air for 1 hr at $200^{\circ}C$ or for 3 days at room temperature. Furthermore, we discussed the results of post-Ag plating with respect to removal level of the oxide layer. X-ray diffraction results revealed that the removal rate of the oxide layer is directly proportional to the concentration of the pretreatment solvent. With the results of Auger electron spectroscopy using oxidized Cu plates, the concentrations required to completely remove 50-nm-thick and 2-nm-thick oxides within 5 min were determined to be X2.5 and X0.13. However, the optimal concentrations in an actual Ag plating process using Cu powder increased to X0.4 and X0.5, respectively, because the oxidation in powder may be accelerated and the complete removal of oxide should be tuned to the thickest oxide layer among all the particles. Back-scattered electron images showed the formation of pure fine Ag particles instead of a uniform and smooth Ag coating in the Ag plating performed after incomplete removal of the oxide layer, indicating that the remaining oxide layer obstructs heterogeneous nucleation and plating by reduced Ag atoms.

• Membrane Journal
• /
• v.32 no.6
• /
• pp.456-464
• /
• 2022

Hydrogen permeation performance was analyzed by manufacturing Pd and Pd-Cu membranes through electroless plating. As a support for the Pd and Pd-Cu membranes, α-Al₂O₃ ceramic hollow fiber were used. Pd-Cu membrane was manufactured through sequential electroless plating, and then annealing was performed at 500°C, for 18 h in a hydrogen atmosphere to make Pd and Cu alloy. After annealing, the Pd-Cu membrane confirmed that the alloy was formed through EDS (Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy) and XRD (X-ray Diffraction) analysis. In addition, the thickness of the Pd and Pd-Cu plating layers were measured to be about 3.21 and 3.72 µm, respectively, through SEM (Scanning Electron Microscope) analysis. Hydrogen permeation performance was tested for hydrogen permeation in the range of 350~450°C and 1~4 bar in hydrogen single gas and mixed gas (H₂, N₂). In a single hydrogen gas, Pd and Pd-Cu membranes have flux of up to 54.42 and 67.17 ml/cm²⋅ min at 450 °C and 4 bar. In the mixed gas, it was confirmed that the separation factors of 1308 and 453 were obtained under the conditions of 450 °C and 4 bar.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
• /
• 2016.02a
• /
• pp.347.1-347.1
• /
• 2016

Screen printing is commonly used to form the electrode for crystalline silicon solar cells. However, it has caused high resistance and low aspect ratio, resulting in decrease of conversion efficiency. Accordingly, Ni/Cu/Ag plating method could be applied for crystalline silicon solar cells to reduce contact resistance. For Ni/Cu/Ag plating, laser ablation process is required to remove anti-reflection layers prior to the plating process, but laser ablation results in surface damage and then decrease of open-circuit voltage and cell efficiency. Another issue with plating process is ghost plating. Ghost plating occurred in the non-metallized region, resulting from pin-hole in anti-reflection layer. In this paper, we investigated the effect of Ni/Cu/Ag plating on the electrical properties, compared to screen printing method. In addition, phosphoric acid layer was spin-coated prior to laser ablation to minimize emitter damage by the laser. Phosphorous elements in phosphoric acid generated selective emitter throughout emitter layer during laser process. Then, KOH treatment was applied to remove surface damage by laser. At this step, amorphous silicon formed by laser ablation was recrystallized during firing process and remaining of amorphous silicon was removed by KOH treatment. As a result, electrical properties as Jsc, FF and efficiency were improved, but Voc was lower than screen printed solar cells because Voc was decreased due to surface damage by laser process. Accordingly, we expect that efficiency of solar cells could be improved by optimization of the process to remove surface damage.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
• /
• v.13 no.2
• /
• pp.101-105
• /
• 2003

In this study, we have investigated the availability of the electroless Ni-B plating for a diffusion barrier of the bus electrode. The Ni-B layer of 1$\beta$: thick was electroless deposited on the electroplated Cu bus electrode for AC plasma display. The layer was to encapsulate Cu bus electrode to prevent from its oxidation and to serve as a diffusion barrier against Cu contamination of the transparent dielectric layer in AC plasma display. The microstructure of the as-plated barrier layer was made of an amorphous phase and the structure was converted to crystalline at about 30$0^{\circ}C$. The concentration of boron was about 5∼6 wt.% in the electroless Ni-B deposit regardless of DMAB concentration. The electroless Ni-B deposit was coated on the surface of the electroplated Cu bus electrode uniformly. And the electroless Ni-B plating was found to be an appropriate process to form the diffusion barrier.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
• /
• v.29 no.6
• /
• pp.370-375
• /
• 2016

In this paper, we investigated the electrical properties of crystalline silicon solar cell fabricated with Ni/Cu/Ag plating. The laser process was used to ablate silicon nitride layer as well as to form the selective emitter. Phosphoric acid layer was spin-coated to prevent damage caused by laser and formed selective emitter during laser process. As a result, the contact resistance was decreased by lower sheet resistance in electrode region. Low sheet resistance was obtained by increasing laser current, but efficiency and open circuit voltage were decreased by damage on the wafer surface. KOH treatment was used to remove the laser damage on the silicon surface prior to metalization of the front electrode by Ni/Cu/Ag plating. Ni and Cu were plated for each 4 minutes and 16 minutes and very thin layer of Ag with $1{\mu}m$ thickness was plated onto Ni/Cu electrode for 30 seconds to prevent oxidation of the electrode. The silicon solar cells with KOH treatment showed the 0.2% improved efficiency compared to those without treatment.

• Journal of Powder Materials
• /
• v.22 no.2
• /
• pp.134-137
• /
• 2015

The monolayer engineering diamond particles are aligned on the oxygen free Cu plates with electroless Ni plating layer. The mean diamond particle sizes of 15, 23 and $50{\mu}m$ are used as thermal conductivity pathway for fabricating metal/carbon multi-layer composite material systems. Interconnected void structure of irregular shaped diamond particles allow dense electroless Ni plating layer on Cu plate and fixing them with 37-43% Ni thickness of their mean diameter. The thermal conductivity decrease with increasing measurement temperature up to $150^{\circ}C$ in all diamond size conditions. When the diamond particle size is increased from $15{\mu}m$ to $50{\mu}m$ (Max. 304 W/mK at room temperature) tended to increase thermal conductivity, because the volume fraction of diamond is increased inside plating layer.