Home>Printed Electronics

PHOTONIC SINTERING OF
NANOPARTICLE INKS ON LOW-
TEMPERATURE SUBSTRATES
FOR PRINTED ELECTRONICS:

PULSED LIGHT EXCELS

The world of printed electronics is moving out of R&D and into production, and new developments in materials—particularly nanoparticle inks and photonic curing from Xenon Corporation—are in the driver’s seat.

Here’s what’s happening in printed electronics: 1.) Functionally conductive inks and coatings now contain nanoparticles that permit the use of low-cost substrates such as paper, PET and polyethylene films. 2.) New developments allow inkjets and screen printers to use silver, gold and most recently, lower-cost copper nanoparticle inks. 3.) It is now possible to print at room temperature on flexible substrates such as printed circuit boards.

Here’s the photonic curing contribution to printed electronics: The challenge has long been heat. How do you sinter or anneal nanoparticle inks at substrate temperatures, which are typically below 160C? Xenon’s photonic pulsed light curing answers this challenge. High energy peak pulses, delivered in milliseconds, quickly heat only the inks and not the substrates. The high energy removes the solvent, leaving only the metal flakes which are sintered or annealed, while the substrate is unaffected. This speed allows copper inks to be sintered too quickly for a surface oxide layer to develop, so conductivity is improved.

For technical information on Xenon’s SINTERON™ 500 benchtop system, click here. For information on SINTERON ™ 2000 rack-mounted system, click here. These systems are available to evaluate the efficiency of pulsed light with substrates, including paper, Pet and polyethylene films.

Xenon will be exhibiting at the following trade shows this year:

Nanotech Conference & Expo2011 13-16 June 2011 Hynes Convention Center Boston MA USA Booth # 1924 Click here for show website Xenon will showcase our new Sinteron systems for Photonic Sintering of nano-inks on heat sensitive flexible substrates like PET and paper for printed electronics. Opto Taiwan 2011 14-16 June 2011 TWTC Nangang Exhibition Hall Taiwan Click here for show website Xenon Corporation will be demonstrating sintering using our Sinteron 2000 system. Materials will be created by Dimatix using their inkjet printing machine, also at the show. Visitors will see how Photonic sintering on heat sensitive flexible materials is achieved using only a few pulses. LOPE-C 2011 28-30 June 2011 Messe Frankfurt, Germany Click here for show website Xenon will be demonstrating sintering using our Sinteron 2000 system. Visitors will see how Photonic sintering on heat sensitive, flexible materials is achieve using only a few pulses.   Printed Electronics USA 2011 1-2 December 2011 Santa Clara Convention Center Santa Clara California USA Click here for show website Xenon Corporation will be showing sintering at our booth using our SINTERON 500 system. This system offers pulsed light technology to quickly heat and fuse conductive nano inks without significantly heating substrates like paper and PET.

Watch the video below of Saad Ahmed, Ph.D., our Engineering Manager talking about The Future of Printed Circuits and Printed Electronics. Specifically about drying nano inks on heat sensitive substrates.

Learn more about Photonic Drying-Pulsed Light as a Low-Temperature Sintering Process by reviewing the presentation made by Lou Panico, Xenon CEO, at the Western Michigan University.

Also available is a paper presented by Dr. Saad Ahmed titled: Printed Circuits from Light.