Photonic curing

Photonic curing of a printed nanosilver trace on PET.

Photonic curing is the high-temperature thermal processing of a thin film using pulsed light from a flashlamp.[1] When this transient processing is done on a low-temperature substrate such as plastic or paper, it is possible to attain a significantly higher temperature than the substrate can ordinarily withstand under an equilibrium heating source such as an oven.[1][2] Since the rate of most thermal curing processes (drying, sintering, reacting, annealing, etc.) generally increase exponentially with temperature (i.e. they obey the Arrhenius equation), this process allows materials to be cured much more rapidly (in about 1 millisecond) than with an oven which can take minutes.[2][3]

Uses

Photonic curing is used as a thermal processing technique in the manufacturing of printed electronics as it allows the substitution of glass or ceramic substrate materials with inexpensive and flexible substrate materials such as polymers or paper. The effect can be demonstrated with an ordinary camera flash.[4] Industrial photonic curing systems are typically water cooled and have controls and features similar to industrial lasers. The pulse rate can be fast enough to allow curing on the fly at speeds beyond 100 m/min making it suitable as a curing process for roll-to-roll processing. Material processing rates can exceed 1 m2/s.[2][5]

Development

Photonic curing is similar to Pulse Thermal Processing, developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, in which a plasma arc lamp is used. In the case of photonic curing, the radiant power is higher and the pulse length is shorter. The total radiant exposure per pulse is less with photonic curing, but the pulse rate is much faster.[6]

Photonic Curing was developed by Nanotechnologies, Inc. (now NovaCentrix) and is incorporated into their PulseForge tools.[7] Xenon Corporation markets photonic curing machines under the brand name Sinteron.[8] Dresden Thin Film also markets capabilities based on the same physics.[9] Photonic curing was introduced at the 2006 NSTI conference and is sometimes referred to as “photonic sintering” since the first application was the sintering of nanosilver and nanocopper inks to form conductive traces on plastic and paper.[2] In addition to sintering metals and ceramics, photonic curing is also used to dry thin films, modulate chemical reactions, and anneal semiconductors such as amorphous silicon.[2] [10][11] Beside semiconductor applications also large area substrates are being post treated by flash lamp annealing systems, like in the architectural glass coating or display manufacturing industry. Therefore large flash lamp annealing systems with a single tube length up to 3.8 m can be used instead of furnace annealing. The 3.8 m tubes (with arc length of 3.72 m) are the longest flash lamps ever manufactured. [12]

References

  1. 1 2 K. A. Schroder, Technical Proceedings of the 2011 NSTI Nanotechnology Conference and Trade Show, 2, 220-223, 2011.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 K. A. Schroder, S. C. McCool, W. R. Furlan, Technical Proceedings of the 2006 NSTI Nanotechnology Conference and Trade Show, 3, 198-201, 2006.
  3. ↑ "In flexible electronics, it’s all about protecting the paper". Research & Development. Retrieved 24 December 2014.
  4. ↑ US Pat. #7,820,097.
  5. ↑ (PDF) https://web.archive.org/20111001171054/http://www.ms.ornl.gov/mpg/pdf/researchthrusts/AP_PTPposterv2.pdf. Archived from the original (PDF) on October 1, 2011. Retrieved July 18, 2011. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  6. ↑ https://web.archive.org/20111001171107/http://www.ms.ornl.gov/mpg/AP_ptp.shtml. Archived from the original on October 1, 2011. Retrieved July 19, 2011. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  7. ↑ https://web.archive.org/20110714203842/http://www.novacentrix.com/product/pulseforge.php. Archived from the original on July 14, 2011. Retrieved July 18, 2011. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  8. ↑ "Thank You for registering with Xenon Corporation". Xenoncorp.com. Retrieved 24 December 2014.
  9. ↑ (PDF) https://web.archive.org/20120327205636/http://www.thin-film.de/fileadmin/medien/Website/Dokumente/Download_Center/Technische_Informationen/No2_FLA.pdf. Archived from the original (PDF) on March 27, 2012. Retrieved July 18, 2011. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  10. ↑ J. West, M. Carter, S. Smith, and J. Sears, Technical Proceedings of the 2010 NSTI Nanotechnology Conference and Expo, 2, 210-213, 2010.
  11. ↑ "Plus Forge 3300 : Manufacturing Development and Production Semiconductor and Photovoltaic Materials" (PDF). Novacentrix.com. Retrieved 23 December 2014.
  12. ↑ http://www.vonardenne.biz/fileadmin/user_upload/druckschriften/Flash_Lamp_Annealing_english.pdf

External links

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