Nickel Electrodeposition studies for high-aspect-ratio microstructure fabrication for MEMS

This work investigates both DC and pulse electroplating techniques for nickel. A nickel sulfamate electrolyte is utilized for nickel deposition over Cu/Ti coated silicon substrates. Stress levels and grain morphology are investigated and analyzed for the electroplated nickel deposit. A comparison is also made between the results obtained from DC and from long and short duration pulse electroplating techniques. Both compressive and tensile built-in stresses are observed in both DC and long duration pulse plated nickel while only compressive stresses are observed in short duration pulse plated nickel.