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Americans love their electronics, and millions will undoubtedly receive everything from flat-screen TVs and e-readers to video games and coffee makers this holiday season. Over time, even the best of these devices inexplicably stop working. Often it’s not worth the time and money to have them repaired, but the nagging question of “why” still lingers long after they’re thrown in the trash.
Yong Sun, a mechanical engineering doctoral student at the University of South Carolina’s College of Engineering and Computing, has solved part of the puzzle.
Little-known culprits of this electronic destruction, tiny killers that leave no evidence the human eye can detect, are microscopic strands known as “whiskers.” These hair-like fibers of metal grow out of the tin used as solder and coating on many electronic circuits. The presence of these whiskers can cause short-circuits since they act as bridges to conduct electricity to closely-spaced parts, a problem expected to become more prevalent as devices are designed smaller and smaller.
The whisker phenomena have been known within scientific circles since the 1940s, but just how these tin whiskers form and grow was largely a mystery. He used a process called digital image correlation to track the deformation of the surfaces and was able to prove the growth of whiskers are caused by high-strain gradient built up inside the device.
Read more here.
Yong Sun, a mechanical engineering doctoral student at the University of South Carolina’s College of Engineering and Computing, has solved part of the puzzle.
Little-known culprits of this electronic destruction, tiny killers that leave no evidence the human eye can detect, are microscopic strands known as “whiskers.” These hair-like fibers of metal grow out of the tin used as solder and coating on many electronic circuits. The presence of these whiskers can cause short-circuits since they act as bridges to conduct electricity to closely-spaced parts, a problem expected to become more prevalent as devices are designed smaller and smaller.
The whisker phenomena have been known within scientific circles since the 1940s, but just how these tin whiskers form and grow was largely a mystery. He used a process called digital image correlation to track the deformation of the surfaces and was able to prove the growth of whiskers are caused by high-strain gradient built up inside the device.
Read more here.
