Patent ID: 7421885

Claim:
A method for determining a presence of at least one killer pore contained within a porous film deposited upon a substrate wherein a pore size of the at least one killer pore is equal to or greater than a reference pore size, the method comprising: a. providing the substrate having the film deposited thereupon wherein the film comprises pores and wherein the pores have a first volume; b. exposing the film to an adsorbate at a temperature and a pressure sufficient to provide condensation of the adsorbate in pores and wherein the pores after the exposing step have a second volume; c. measuring the difference between the first and the second volume; d. repeating steps b and c wherein the condensed adsorbate has a different density than the previous exposure; e. calculating the pore size and volume for each exposure using the difference in the first and the second volume, the pressure, and a model that relates pressure to pore diameter and accounts for the change in density of the condensed adsorbate; f. obtaining a maximum pore size from the distribution; and g. determining the presence of at least one killer pore by comparing the maximum pore size to a reference pore size.