Texture in cold rolled and high-temperature annealed Cu foils

Thick single crystal Cu foil substrates with specific crystallographic orientations such as {111} and {110} planes parallel to the rolling plane are desired for epitaxial growth of two-dimensional materials such as graphene. In this study, annealing experiments of a 46 μm thick cold-rolled foil were carried out at temperatures in the range of 300-1040 °C. The texture evolution during annealing was followed by electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) orientation mapping. It was found that the texture evolution may be divided into three stages: at relatively low annealing temperatures, a strong cube texture develops with a small population of grains having relatively larger deviations from the cube orientation; at medium temperatures, these grains with large deviations grow abnormally; and at the highest temperature, annealing twins form in the abnormally growing grains giving rise to new orientations including some with the {111} planes parallel to the rolling plane.