In the field of metal-semiconductor composites based plasmon-mediated chemical reactions, a clear and in-depth understanding of charge transfer and recombination mechanisms is crucial for improving plasmonic photocatalytic efficiency. However, the plasmonic photocatalytic reactions at the solid-liquid interface of the electrochemical systems involve complex processes with multiple elementary steps, multiple time scales, and multiple controlling factors. Herein, the combination of photoelectrochemical and electrochemical as well as spectroscopic characterizations has been successfully used to study the effects of traps on the photo-induced interfacial charge transfer of silver-titanium dioxide (Ag-TiO₂). The results show that the increase of surface hydroxyl groups may be the key reason leading to the increase of traps after the Ag deposition on the surface of TiO₂. The increased traps of Ag-TiO₂, including deep and shallow traps, subsequently lead to the quenching of fluorescence and the reduction of photocurrent in the UV region. But the enhanced trap recombination may also prolong the lifetime of carriers. The modulation of traps is bound to affect the interfacial charge transfer, and thus, change the amount and lifetime of hot carriers, which can be exploited to manipulate the molecular reactions at the Ag surface. Our work highlights the importance of traps at metal-semiconductor electrodes that may help utilize the hot carriers in plasmonic mediated chemical reactions.

Copper interconnects are essential to the functionality, performance, power efficiency, reliability, and fabrication yield of electronic devices. They are widely found in chips, packaging substrates and printed circuit boards, and are often produced by copper electroplating in an acidic aqueous solution. Organic additives play a decisive role in regulating copper deposition to fill microgrooves, and micro-vias to form fine lines and interlayer interconnects. Generally, an additive package consists of three components (brightener, suppressor, and leveler), which have a synergistic effect of super-filling on electroplating copper when the concentration ratio is appropriate. Many works of literature have discussed the mechanism of super filling and the electrochemical behavior of representative additive molecules; however, few articles discussed the chemical structure and preparation of the additives. Herein, this paper focuses on the preparation method and the rapid electrochemical screening of each additive component to provide an idea for the future development of copper electroplating additives.

High density nanotwinned copper films were pulse electroplated using an optimized electrolyte. In order to find out the influencing factors on the formation of nanotwins, series contents of MPS were added to the electrolyte during the pulse electroplating process. It was found that the copper films electroplated without MPS had large grains but a few nanotwins. And the grain size was about 0.9 μm on average, and the texture components of (110) and (111) crystal orientations were calculated as 49% and 27.8%, respectively. Differently, when 10 ppm MPS was added, the microstructure was changed to columnar grain with high density of horizontal nanotwins and the crystal orientation was also changed to highly (111) orientated one. However, when the MPS content was continuously increased from 10 ppm to 40 ppm, the microstructure and crystal orientation were almost unchanged as detected by the secondary ion microscopy of focus ion beam and X ray diffraction. Specifically, when 40 ppm MPS was used, the average grain size was 0.6 μm, and the texture components of (110) and (111) crystal orientations were 3.45% and 95.1%, respectively. It demonstrated that the nanotwinned copper can be electroplated at a large concentration range of MPS, which also meant that the filling ability of nanotwinned copper electrolyte could be adjusted by MPS content without influencing the microstructure. Finally, these electrolytes with different contents of MPS were used in the Damascene via filling. The results showed that when the content of MPS was 40 ppm, the Damascus via was completely filled without voids. The achievement of via filling with nanotwinned copper makes the application of nanotwinned copper possible in Integrated Circuit (IC) fabrication, which also greatly promotes the development of interconnected material for next generation.

The high energy density of NCM batteries with high nickel content is a key advantage in replacing fossil fuels and promoting clean energy development, at the same time, is also a fundamental cause of serious safety hazards in batteries. Primary and secondary amines can lead to ring-opening polymerization of common ethylene carbonate electrolytes, resulting in an isolation layer between the cathode and the anode, and improving the thermal safety of the battery. In this work, the safety of batteries is considered both at the material level and at the cell level, based on the chemical reactions between amines and the battery components. At the material level, the effect of the presence or absence of amine additives on the thermal stability of the different components of the lithium-ion battery was tested by differential scanning calorimetry. At the cell level, the safety of the whole battery with and without additives was tested by using accelerating rate calorimeter to extract thermal runaway (TR) characteristic temperatures. The addition of the amine resulted in an earlier onset of some of the chemical reactions between the battery components, as well as a significant reduction in total heat release and a decrease in the maximum temperature rise rate, such that TR, was effectively suppressed.