Browsing by Author "Luo, Xichun"

Now showing 1 - 7 of 7
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    Atomic scale friction studies on single crystal gallium arsenide using atomic force microscope and molecular dynamics simulation
    (Springer, 2021-07-10) Fan, Pengfei; Goel, Saurav; Luo, Xichun; Upadhyaya, Hari M.
    This paper provides a fresh perspective and new insights on the nanoscale friction investigated using molecular dynamics simulation and atomic force microscope (AFM) nanoscratch experiments. The work considered Gallium Arsenide, an important III-V direct bandgap semiconductor material residing in the zinc-blende structure as a reference sample material due to its growing usage in 5G communication devices. In the simulations, the scratch depth was tested as a variable in the fine range of 0.5 nm to 3 nm to understand the behaviour of material removal as well as to gain insights into the nanoscale friction. Scratch force, normal force and average cutting forces were extracted from the simulation to obtain two scalar quantities namely, the scratch cutting energy (defined as the work done in removing a unit volume of material) and kinetic coefficient of friction (defined as the force ratio). A strong size effect was observed for scratch depths below 2 nanometres from the MD simulations and about 15 nm from the AFM experiments. A strong quantitative corroboration was obtained between the MD simulations and the AFM experiments in the specific scratch energy and more qualitative corroboration with the pile up and the kinetic coefficient of friction. This conclusion suggested that the specific scratch energy is insensitive to the tool geometry and the speed of scratch used in this investigation but the pile up and kinetic coefficient of friction are dependent on the geometry of the tool tip
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    An atomistic investigation on the wear of diamond during atomic force microscope tip-based nanomachining of gallium arsenide
    (Elsevier, 2020-10-30) Fan, Pengfei; Goel, Saurav; Luo, Xichun; Yan, Yongda; Geng, Yanquan; Wang, Yuzhang
    This paper investigated the wear mechanism of diamond during the atomic force microscope (AFM) tip-based nanomachining of Gallium Arsenide (GaAs) using molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The elastic-plastic deformation at the apex of the diamond tip was observed during the simulations. Meanwhile, a transition of the diamond tip from its initial cubic diamond lattice structure sp3 hybridization to graphite lattice structure sp2 hybridization was revealed. Graphitization was, therefore, found to be the dominant wear mechanism of the diamond tip during the nanometric cutting of single crystal gallium arsenide for the first time. The various stress states, such as hydrostatic stress, shear stress, and von Mises stress within the diamond tip and the temperature distribution of the diamond tip were also estimated to find out the underlying mechanism of graphitization. The results showed that the cutting heat during nanomachining of GaAs would mainly lead to the graphitization of the diamond tip instead of the high shear stress-induced transformation of the diamond to graphite. The paper also proposed a new approach to quantify the graphitization conversion rate of the diamond tip
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    Brittle ductile transition during diamond turning of single crystal silicon carbide
    (Elsevier Science B.V., Amsterdam., 2013-02-28T00:00:00Z) Goel, Saurav; Luo, Xichun; Comley, Paul; Reuben, Robert L.; Cox, Andrew
    In this experimental study, diamond turning of single crystal 6H-SiC was performed at a cutting speed of 1 m/sec on an ultra precision diamond turning machine (Moore Nanotech 350 UPL) to elucidate the microscopic origin of ductile-regime machining. Distilled water (pH value 7) was used as a preferred coolant during the course of machining in order to improve the tribological performance. A high magnification scanning electron microscope (SEM) (FIB- FEI Quanta 3D FEG) was used to examine the cutting tool. A surface finish of Ra 9.2 nm, better than any previously reported value on SiC was obtained. Also, tremendously high cutting resistance was offered by SiC resulting in the observation of significant wear marks on the cutting tool just after 1 Km of cutting length. It was found out through a DXR Raman microscope that similar to other classical brittle materials (silicon and germanium etc.) an occurrence of brittle-ductile transition is responsible for the ductile-regime machining of 6H-SiC. It has also been demonstrated that the structural phase transformations associated with the diamond turning of brittle materials which is normally considered as a prerequisite to ductile-regime machining, may not well be realized during machining of polycrystalline materials, yet, ductile-regime exploitation is possible.
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    Molecular dynamics simulation of AFM tip-based hot scratching of nanocrystalline GaAs
    (Elsevier, 2021-04-08) Fan, Pengfei; Goel, Saurav; Luo, Xichun; Yan, Yongda; Geng, Yanquan; He, Yang; Wang, Yuzhang
    GaAs is a hard, brittle material and its cutting at room-temperature is rather difficult, so the work explored whether hot conditions improve its cutting performance or not. Atomic force microscope (AFM) tip-based hot machining of the (0 1 0) oriented single crystal GaAs was simulated using molecular dynamics (MD). Three representative temperatures 600 K, 900 K and 1200 K (below the melting temperature of ~1511 K) were used to cut GaAs to benchmark against the cutting performance at 300 K using indicators such as the cutting forces, kinetic coefficient of friction, cutting temperature, shear plane angle, sub-surface damage depth, shear strain in the cutting zone, and stress on the diamond tip. Hotter conditions resulted in the reduction of cutting forces by 25% however, the kinetic coefficient of friction went up by about 8%. While material removal rate was found to increase with the increase of the substrate temperature, it was accompanied by an increase of the sub-surface damage in the substrate. Simulations at 300 K showed four major types of dislocations with Burgers vector 1/2<110>, 1/6<112>, <0-11> and 1/2<1-12> underneath the cutting zone and these were found to cause ductile response in zinc-blende GaAs. Lastly, a phenomenon of chip densification was found to occur during hot cutting which referred to the fact that the amorphous cutting chips obtained from cutting at low temperature will have lower density than the chips obtained from cutting at higher temperatures.
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    Nanoindentation of polysilicon and single crystal silicon: Molecular dynamics simulation and experimental validation
    (IOP Publishing, 2014-06-06) Goel, Saurav; Faisal, Nadimul Haque; Luo, Xichun; Yan, Jiwang; Agrawal, Anupam
    This paper presents novel advances in the deformation behaviour of polycrystalline and single crystal silicon using molecular dynamics (MD) simulation and validation of the same via nanoindentation experiments. In order to unravel the mechanism of deformation, four simulations were performed: indentation of a polycrystalline silicon substrate with a (i) Berkovich pyramidal and a (ii) spherical (arc) indenter, and (iii and iv) indentation of a single crystal silicon substrate with these two indenters. The simulation results reveal that high pressure phase transformation (HPPT) in silicon (Si-I to Si-II phase transformation) occurred in all cases; however, its extent and the manner in which it occurred differed significantly between polycrystalline silicon and single crystal silicon, and was the main driver of differences in the nanoindentation deformation behaviour between these two types of silicon. Interestingly, in polycrystalline silicon, the HPPT was observed to occur more preferentially along the grain boundaries than across the grain boundaries. An automated dislocation extraction algorithm (DXA) revealed no dislocations in the deformation zone, suggesting that HPPT is the primary mechanism in inducing plasticity in silicon.
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    Origins of ductile plasticity in a polycrystalline gallium arsenide during scratching: MD simulation study
    (Elsevier, 2021-03-09) Fan, Pengfei; Goel, Saurav; Luo, Xichun; Yan, Yongda; Geng, Yanquan; He, Yang
    This paper used molecular dynamics simulation to reveal the origins of the ductile plasticity in polycrystalline gallium arsenide (GaAs) during its nanoscratching. Velocity-controlled nanoscratching tests were performed with a diamond tool to study the friction-induced deformation behaviour of polycrystalline GaAs. Cutting temperature, sub-surface damage depth, cutting stresses, the evolution of dislocations and the subsequent microstructural changes were extracted from the simulation. The simulated MD data indicated that the deformation of polycrystalline GaAs is accompanied by dislocation nucleation in the grain boundaries (GBs) leading to the initiation of plastic deformation. Furthermore, the 1/2〈1 1 0〉 is the main type of dislocation responsible for ductile plasticity in polycrystalline GaAs. The magnitude of cutting forces and the extent of sub-surface damage were both observed to reduce with an increase in the scratch velocity whereas the cutting temperature scaled with the cutting velocity. As for the depth of the scratch, an increase in its magnitude increased the cutting forces, temperature and damage-depth. A phenomenon of fluctuation from wave crests to wave troughs in the cutting forces was observed only during the cutting of polycrystalline GaAs and not during the cutting of single-crystal GaAs.
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    Surface defects incorporated diamond machining of silicon
    (IOP, 2020-07-31) Khatri, Neha; Barkachary, Borad; Muneeswaran, B.; Al-Sayegh, Rajab; Luo, Xichun; Saurav, Goel
    This paper reports the performance enhancement benefits in diamond turning of the silicon wafer by incorporation of the Surface Defect Machining (SDM) method. The hybrid micromachining methods usually require additional hardware to leverage the added advantage of hybrid technologies such as laser heating, cryogenic cooling, electric pulse or ultrasonic elliptical vibration. The SDM method tested in this paper does not require any such additional baggage and is easy to implement in a sequential micro-machining mode. This paper made use of Raman spectroscopy data, average surface roughness data and imaging data of the cutting chips of silicon for drawing a comparison between conventional Single Point Diamond Turning (SPDT) and SDM while incorporating surface defects in the (i) circumferential and (ii) radial directions. Complimentary 3D Finite Element Analysis (FEA) was performed to analyse the cutting forces and the evolution of residual stress on the machined wafer. It was found that the surface defects generated in the circumferential direction with an interspacing of 1 mm revealed the lowest average surface roughness (Ra) of 3.2 nm as opposed to 8 nm Ra obtained through conventional SPDT using the same cutting parameters. The observation of the Raman spectroscopy performed on the cutting chips showed remnants of phase transformation during the micromachining process in all cases. FEA was used to extract quantifiable information about the residual stress as well as the sub-surface integrity and it was discovered that the grooves made in the circumferential direction gave the best machining performance. The information being reported here is expected to provide an avalanche of opportunities in the SPDT area for low-cost machining solution for a range of other nominal hard, brittle materials such as SiC, ZnSe and GaAs as well as hard steels