Figure 7.

Bending fracture experiment with silicon nanowires inside an SEM. A cantilever (shaded red) bends a pillar (shaded green) laterally (a) until it finally breaks off (b). (c) Finite element simulations of the curved foot base of a pillar. Geometry of bending experiment and foot base with a curvature κ = 10⁻²nm⁻¹. Largest tensile (red) and compressive (blue) stresses occur above the substrate–pillar interface. (d) Deviations due to curved foot base with respect to Equation (12), which assumes idealized uniform cylinder geometry. Modified from Hoffmann et al. [89].