Investigation of the temperature dependence in Black's equation using microscopic electromigration modeling

The long-standing speculation regarding an additional temperature dependence in Black's equation is addressed. Under the premise that the activation energy measured using Black's equation, E-a, should be equal to the energy barrier for atomic hopping, we provide evidence for an additional T-2 dependence of the failure time. Microscopic modeling provides an explicit connection between the macroscopic model behavior and the microscopic parameters of the model. These results may provide a reliable method for measuring activation energies for self-diffusion in pure metals. (C) 1999 American Institute of Physics. [S0021- 8979(99)03019-4].