Enhanced adhesion between metals and polymers

A method for depositing a metal onto an organic polymer substrate in order to maximize the adhesion between the metal and the substrate, including the steps of:

• heating said organic polymer substrate to a temperature approximately (0.6-0.8) of its curing temperature T.sub.c,
• depositing on said organic polymer substrate a metal selected from the group consisting of Ni, Cu, Al, Au, Ag, Ta, Rh, and Pd, said substrate being heated to a temperature within the approximate range (0.6-0.8) T.sub.c during the deposition of said metal thereon at least until a few atomic layers of a continuous metal film are formed on the surface of said substrate, said substrate temperature and the deposition rate of metal atoms onto said substrate being chosen such that intermixing of metal atoms and said substrate is optimized to a distance less than about 1000 angstroms into said substrate to maximize adhesion between said metal and said substrate.

A method for making a metal layer-organic substrate composite having increased adhesion between the metal layer and the organic substrate, including the steps of

• heating said organic substrate to a temperature approximately (0.6-0.8) of its curing temperature T.sub.c,
• depositing thereon a metal selected from the group consisting of Ni, Cu, Al, Ag, Ta, Pt, Ir, Rh, Pd, Zn, and Cd, said deposition being at a rate sufficiently slow that diffusion of metal atoms into said organic substrate can occur, said organic substrate being heated to a temperature in the approximate range (0.6-0.8) T.sub.c during said deposition for a time sufficiently long to allow optimum intermixing between said metal and the atomic constituents of said substrate over a distance less than about 1000 angstroms into said organic substrate in order to maximize adhesion between said metal and said substrate.

A method for producing a metal-polyimide composite having good adhesion between said metal and polyimide, comprising the steps of:

• depositing a metal selected from group consisting of Cu, Ni, and Al onto said polyimide while said polyimide is heated to a temperature in the range of about (0.6-0.8) T.sub.c, where T.sub.c is the curing temperature of said polyimide, and
• adjusting the rate of arrival of atoms of said metal at the surface of said polyimide to be about equal to or less than the diffusion rate of said metal atoms into said substrate.