Application of bimaterial interface corner failure mechanics to silicon/glass anodic bonds

Motivated by the existence of a universal singular stress field at bimaterial interface corners, a fair amount of work has been performed to support the use of the corresponding critical stress intensities to correlate fracture initiation. The approach is in the spirit of interface fracture mechanics but applicable to a different class of problems, specifically, when a crack does not previously exist (or cannot be detected, at least economically), and when subsequent crack propagation does not necessarily occur along the interface. Here we further progress toward the development, understanding, and application of the approach, both experimentally and theoretically, for a series of silicon/glass anodically bonded structures. To this end we designed and fabricated two series of silicon/glass anodically bonded bimaterial specimens with different interface corner geometries that commonly arise from different silicon etching technologies. Offset three-point flexure tests were performed that resulted in brittle fracture that initiated at the interface corner. From a rigorous stress analysis at the interface corner, we determined the order of the stress singularities and the angular variation of the stress fields. We computed the corresponding stress intensities via full-field finite element analyses of the silicon/glass specimens loaded in offset three-point flexure. Measured fracture data show that although the failure stress varies significantly with bond size, the corresponding critical stress intensity of the dominant mode is constant, thus providing support for its use as a fracture initiation criterion. In the light of both the stress analysis and the measured fracture data, we discuss the effect of mode mixity (loosely shearing versus opening) and show that it has little influence on the results for the specimens and loading considered in this study. Via an idealized model of a small crack, either interfacial or extending into one of the adherends, we study the effects of geometrical perturbations at the interface corner on the stress state, and discuss implications for fracture analysis and interpretation of fracture data. We also explore the prediction of the crack initiation angle and achieve reasonable success with a simple criterion based on the maximum circumferential stress near the uncracked interface corner.