Berkovich nanoindentation-induced dislocation energetics and pop-in effects in ZnSe thin films

The Berkovich nanoindentation-induced characteristic pop-in'' phenomena observed in ZnSe thin films are investigated in this study. The ZnSe thin films are grown on the GaAs(001) substrates by using the molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) system. No evidence of nanoindentation-induced phase transformation was revealed in ZnSe thin film by the cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy (XTEM) and selected area diffraction (SAD) analyses. Furthermore, as displayed in the SAD results, the distortion of diffraction spots did indicate severe deformation of indented ZnSe thin films resulting from the nanoindentation load. Based on this scenario, an energetic estimation of dislocation nucleation is made. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.