Investigation into Hardness and Young’s Modulus of Thin Films of Lead Germanium Telluride

Abstract

A mechanically robust infrared high-index coating material is essential to the infrared interference coatings. Lead germanium telluride (Pb1-xGexTe) is a pseudo-binary alloy of IV-VI narrow gap semiconductors of PbTe and GeTe. In our investigation, the hardness and Young’s modulus of thin films of Pb1-xGexTe, which were deposited on silicon substrates using electron beam evaporation, were identified by means of nanoindentation measurement. It is demonstrated that layers of Pb1-xGexTe have greater hardness and Young’s modulus compared with those of PbTe. These mechanical behaviors of layers can be linked to a ferroelectric phase transition from a cubic paraelectric phase to a rhombohedral, ferroelectric phase. Moreover, the strength loss in the layers of Pb1-xGexTe can be also explained in light of strong localized elastic-strain fields in concentrated solid solutions.