Effects of grain boundary adhesion and grain size on ductility of thin metal films on polymer substrates

We have studied the effects of grain boundary adhesion and grain size on the ductility of thin metal films well bonded to polymer substrates, using a finite element method. It is shown that the ductility of polymer-supported metal films increases approximately linearly as the grain boundary adhesion increases, and as the grain size decreases. A rule-of-thumb estimate of the ductility of polymer-supported metal films agrees well with the simulation results.