Abstract
Mechanochemical reactions at the sliding interface between a single-crystalline silicon (Si) wafer and a silica (SiO2) microsphere were studied in three environmental conditions: humid air, potassium chloride (KCl) solution, and KCl solution with an applied voltage. Compared to that from humid air, mechanochemical material removal from the silicon surface increased substantially in the KCl-immersed condition, and further increased when electrochemistry was introduced into the tribological system. By measuring the load dependence of the material removal rate and analyzing the results using a mechanically assisted Arrhenius-type kinetic model, the activation energy (Ea) and the mechanical energy (Em), by which this energy is reduced by mechanical activation, were compared qualitatively under different environmental conditions. In the KCl-immersed condition, mechanochemistry may decrease the required effective energy of reactions (Eeff = Ea − Em) and promote material removal mainly through improved catalysis of the mechanochemical reactions facilitated by greater availability of water molecules compared to the humid air condition. Thus, the effectiveness of the mechanochemistry is improved. In the electrochemical condition, electrochemically-accelerated oxidation of the silicon surface was confirmed by the X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) characterization. The results strongly suggest that electrochemistry further stimulates mechanochemical reactions primarily by increasing the initial energy state of the surface via the facilitated formation of interfacial bonding bridges, i.e., a surface oxidation/hydroxylation process.
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Acknowledgements
This work has been carried out at Advanced Research Center for Nanolithography (ARCNL), a public-private partnership of University of Amsterdam (UvA), Vrije University Amsterdam (VU), the Dutch Research Council (NWO), and the semiconductor equipment manufacturer (Advanced Semiconductor Material Lithography (ASML)). Bart WEBER acknowledges funding from the NWO VENI (Grant No. VI.Veni.192.177).
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Chen XIAO: conceptualization, methodology, validation, formal analysis, data curation, and writing—original draft. Stefan VAN VLIET: methodology, formal analysis, data curation, and writing—review & editing. Roland BLIEM: resources, formal analysis, and writing—review & editing. Bart WEBER: resources, formal analysis, writing—review & editing, and funding acquisition. Steve FRANKLIN: conceptualization, supervision, formal analysis, writing—review & editing, and funding acquisition.
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Steve FRANKLIN. He received his bachelor’s degree in material science from Sheffield Hallam University, UK, and his Ph.D. degree in metallurgy from Loughborough University of Technology, UK. He moved to the Netherlands in 1986 and has more than 35 years of experience in industrial research and development, researching and applying tribology, and material science and engineering principles within the healthcare, medical, consumer electronics, and semiconductor manufacturing industries. From 2017 to 2023, he built up and led the Contact Dynamics group at Advanced Research Center for Nanolithography (ARCNL), the Netherlands, and is Visiting Professor in Tribology at the University of Sheffield, UK and at University of Amsterdam (UvA), the Netherlands.
Chen XIAO. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher in Advanced Research Center for Nanolithography (ARCNL), the Netherlands. He earned his Ph.D. degree in mechanical design and theory from Southwest Jiaotong University, China, in 2019. His research focused on nanotribology.
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Xiao, C., Van Vliet, S., Bliem, R. et al. Electrochemically-stimulated nanoscale mechanochemical wear of silicon. Friction 11, 2142–2152 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40544-023-0764-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40544-023-0764-4