You are on page 1of 7

G Model

JMP-635; No. of Pages 7 ARTICLE IN PRESS


Journal of Manufacturing Processes xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Manufacturing Processes


journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/manpro

Fabrication and electrical characterization of multi-layer capacitive


touch sensors on flexible substrates by additive e-jet printing
Hantang Qin a,∗ , Jingyan Dong b , Yuan-Shin Lee b
a
Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering, Iowa State University, Ames, IA, 50011 USA
b
Industrial and Systems Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695 USA

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Current consumer electronics, in particular touch displays and flexible electronics, were limited by the
Received 17 November 2016 properties of existing commercial transparent conductor materials used as electrodes both in flat panel
Received in revised form 15 February 2017 display and capacitive touch sensors. In this paper, an alternative fabrication technique using silver
Accepted 3 March 2017
nanoink that can be used for rapid prototyping of high-resolution electrode arrays to replace indium
Available online xxx
tin oxide (ITO) for flexible electronics was presented. By direct printing silver nanoparticles on flexible
substrates, capacitive touch sensors were fabricated onto polyethylene terephthalate (PET) film. Exper-
Keywords:
iments were conducted to study the feasibility of electrohydrodynamic inkjet printing (e-jet printing)
Electrohydrodynamic
Inkjet printing
of high-resolution electrodes for touch sensors. Sensitivity of sub-20 ␮m capacitance sensor array was
Capacitive touch sensor investigated in the study for droplet and humidity detection applications. The rapid prototyping method
Silver nano makes a significant impact in enabling simultaneously (1) customized and flexible touch sensors, (2)
cost-effective manufacturing, and (3) high resolution and good sensitivity. The presented techniques
can be used for the on-demand fabrication of customized conductive patterns for flexible and wearable
electronics.
© 2017 The Society of Manufacturing Engineers. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction using roll-to-roll manufacturing or printing methods that enable


simple handling and fast processing [10]. The ideal ITO replace-
Flexible electronics have been rapidly developed in the last few ment material should be a printable or coatable conductor material.
years and have shown a good potential to be the next technology Nanowires and other forms of metal meshes have emerged as ITO
revolution in electronics; similar to the way integrated circuits was replacement materials. On one hand, they offer benefits for large-
in the 1960s. Flexible electronics are not only flexible mechani- area flexible displays where conductivity and flexibility of ITO on
cally, but also flexible in functionalities in all kinds of applications, plastic substrates is an issue. On the other hand, the overall manu-
ranging from personal devices (wearable devices [1,2]), electronic facturing cost can be reduced as they all have flexibility in printing
memory devices [3] to large area sensors (biomedical sensor arrays or coating.
[4], solar cells [5,6], flexible displays [7,8]), and radio-frequency Touch sensors have been commercially available for over thirty
identification devices [9]. Display industry has been driving new years and widely used everywhere such as touchpad, tactile
development of flexible screens for portable devices. Indium tin devices, and fluid detection applications. They are still regarded
oxide (ITO) is the current industry standard materials used as trans- as new technologies in engineering and business communities
parent conductor electrodes. ITO is a brittle ceramic material which with emerging innovation continuing in touch sensor technologies.
makes it unsuitable for flexible electronics. ITO in most cases is Touch sensors are based on various techniques, including resistive,
fabricated through a vacuum deposition process. A most distin- capacitive and infrared sensors [11–13]. Capacitive sensing repre-
guishing feature of flexible electronics is the possibility to print sents the second most widely used sensing method. Touch activity
or coat the device directly onto thin flexible carrier substrates is identified by detecting minor changes in electrical charge gener-
ated by the contact with an object. Substrates for capacitive touch
sensors may be glass or flexible polymers, or combination of them
∗ Corresponding author. [14]. The sensors are usually constructed as narrow strips of con-
E-mail address: hqin@ncsu.edu (H. Qin). ductors. Interdigital electrodes are among the most commonly used

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2017.04.015
1526-6125/© 2017 The Society of Manufacturing Engineers. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article in press as: Qin H, et al. Fabrication and electrical characterization of multi-layer capacitive touch sensors on
flexible substrates by additive e-jet printing. J Manuf Process (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2017.04.015
G Model
JMP-635; No. of Pages 7 ARTICLE IN PRESS
2 H. Qin et al. / Journal of Manufacturing Processes xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

sensor structures. The change in capacitance caused by proximity an RC relaxation oscillator circuit. The analysis of electrical per-
of a finger near an intersection is 1pF or less, and the effect on formance of parallel coplanar patterns and high-resolution pattern
adjacent electrode may be less than 0.1 pF [15]. Analysis of capac- was conducted to test electrical properties of direct printed pat-
itance changes at or near intersections of electrode reports the terns.
touch action if change in capacitance exceeds the system threshold. The results of experimental tests confirmed that capacitive
Capacitive sensors show excellent sensitivity, and are unaffected sensors fabricated by the proposed additive e-jet printing could
by most contaminations. These advantages have provided particu- be effective for sensor applications. The sensors exhibited great
larly attractive options for them to be applied into next generation stretchability, high sensitivity, and fast response time (∼30 ms).
flexible electronics and in microfluidic devices [16]. Both high resolution and electrical properties were achieved in
The fabrication methods for flexible electronics are very differ- the work. The proposed fabrication technique is capable of rapid
ent from modern semiconductor technologies. Flexible electronics prototyping of electronic components for flexible electronic, med-
generally have large overall device dimensions and use different ical sensors, wearable devices, and radio frequency identification
types of substrates. This is different from integrated silicon based devices.
chips of modern CMOS technology which focus on minimizing
area, improving device densities and reducing sizes. The challenge
for modern flexible electronics is to find new solutions for pro- 2. Capacitive touch sensors
ducing large area electronic with full mechanical and electrical
functions while reducing costs. Many research groups are working Projected capacitive technology is a technology based on capac-
on alternative fabrication method to replace conventional process itive coupling effect, which can detect anything that is conductive
such as photolithography and vacuum deposition while meet- or has different dielectric effects from air [20]. The technology has
ing high-performance, resolution, manufacturing needs and cost been widely used in modern touch screens. A basic construction
requirements. Among them, additive printing shows its potential of a typical projected capacitive touch screen includes a top layer
to be the best fabrication process for flexible devices in prototyping touch surface (chemically strengthened cover glass with holes and
domain. It can be scaled to very large areas with full microelectronic slots cut into it), optical bonding adhesives, touch sensor arrays
function. Additive printing is a noncontact jet printing process that (usually a glass separator with indium tin oxide deposited on
is capable of fabricating both silicon based and polymeric based both sides), and the bottom LED/LCD screen [21], as shown in
TFTs and electronic components. However, its feature resolution Fig. 1. Projected capacitive technology provides advantages such as
is limited by the size of droplets, which is typically above 30 ␮m. multi-touch detection, excellent optical properties, and long life.
Meanwhile, by incorporating it with roll-to-roll fabrication, addi- Projected capacitive touch sensors are easy to integrate into sys-
tive printing can help to reduce process and material cost for tems to eliminate coordinate drift [22]. Projected capacitive touch
flexible electronic fabrication. sensors can be adapted into both glass and plastic, and flat and
Directly printing approaches, especially those based on ink curved surface. Most touch applications are immune to chemi-
jet printing in high-resolution fabrication situation, demonstrate cal attacks and extreme temperatures because sensors are usually
attractive features in their application. First, inkjet printing is non- sealed by the protection layers.
contact, which means any substrates can be processed. Materials The electrodes are active conductive elements of the sensor.
can be deposited on planar or curved substrates, as long as there is Many electrode patterns can be used to create projected capacitive
a stand-off distance between the print head and substrate. Second, sensor. The electrode pattern geometries are an important factor in
inkjet printing is capable of depositing a wide range of materials sensitivity and resolution of the sensor. For the projected capacitive
given appropriate print heads. Third, the printing process is scal- touch sensor pattern shown in Fig. 1, the touch sensor arrays are
able. The use of multiple print heads has been reported to print “scanned” in working conditions. Each individual electrode or elec-
wider pattern or several materials at the same time [17]. Fourth, trode intersection is measured one-by-one. In a typical scanning for
inkjet printing is flexible in position. [18] The location can be touch sensor arrays, the controller will drive a single column (Y)
changed in real time to ensure high quality patterns. It also shows and then scan every row (X) that intersects with the column. The
potential for mass production and low cost operation [19]. These capacitance value at each X-Y intersection will be measured and
features of inkjet printing make it particularly attractive for rapid compared with initial values to determine location of objects [23].
prototyping of such flexible capacitance sensors. The process is repeated for every column until the entire pattern
However, there are still plenty of challenges before inkjet print- is scanned. The columns and rows of touch displays are physically
ing can be applied for rapid prototyping of electrical components fixed. Since each intersection is responsible for a small area. The
for flexible electronics. First, most of complex, multi-functional capacitive touch sensors are more precise than any other methods.
metal or alloy inks have to be characterized before they can be The development of capacitive touch displays has evolved since the
adapted into real applications. Second, there are resolution issues past 10 years with patents and introduction of iPhone from Apple
with current inkjet printing methods, and the electrical perfor- in 2007.
mance of printed patterns needs to be investigated. The actual functioning area is shown on the right in Fig. 1. The
In this paper, the focus is in device and system integration active functioning components are the intersection areas. It can be
level to test products from electrohydrodynamic inkjet printing modeled using the simple capacitor model.
(e-jet printing) on underlying of electrode structure, materials, C = εr ε0 A/d, where C is the capacitance of intersection, ε0 is
and fabrication process. The capacitance sensor design, sensitivity, permittivity of free space (8.85* 10−12 F/m), εr is the relative per-
and electrical performance on flexible substrates were investi- mittivity to space of filling material. The value of capacitance is
gated in the study. The new techniques was presented to fabricate related to surface area of plates, distance between plates, and mate-
integrated capacitance sensors using additive e-jet printing with rials constant for insulating films. In this design, patterning ITO
conductive silver nano-ink. With the help of e-jet printing, sub- on glass with line widths of 20 ␮m and resistivity of 2–6  *␮m
20 ␮m features can be on-demand printed on any substrates. The is commonly accomplished using photolithography. Micro level
presented method can be adapted into rapid prototyping of touch metal wires (sub-20 ␮m) can be a good substitute for sputtered ITO
pads or micro fluid detecting sensors in micro scale. The interdigi- in most cases. When it comes to flexible electronics, e.g. pattern
tal design maximizes the capacitive signals for sensor applications on flexible PET film, line width based on screen-printing or laser
in 2D domain. The over-all performance was characterized using ablation are typically 100-200 ␮m. There are increasing demands

Please cite this article in press as: Qin H, et al. Fabrication and electrical characterization of multi-layer capacitive touch sensors on
flexible substrates by additive e-jet printing. J Manuf Process (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2017.04.015
G Model
JMP-635; No. of Pages 7 ARTICLE IN PRESS
H. Qin et al. / Journal of Manufacturing Processes xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 3

Fig. 1. Schematic of structures in projected capacitive touch screens: row and column stack up layers.

for developing new techniques to fabricate high-resolution capac-


itance sensors on flexible substrates with both good conductivity
and sensitivity.
In our previous publication, we have demonstrated fabrication
of 2D touch sensor array fabrication and modeling of interdigital
electrodes [24,25]. The thickness of polypropylene film is about
40 ␮m. It is desired to take this into consideration when developing
an analytical model of detection.
There are several challenges to fabricate the projected capaci-
tive sensors before they can be used in flexible devices. First, it is
relatively expensive in fabrication to build large-area screens for
depositing electrodes sensor arrays. Electrodes patterns are most
commonly deposited on surfaces by physical vapor deposition, such
Fig. 2. Fabrication platform for E-jet printing.
as electron beam deposition and sputter deposition techniques,
which are costly deposition methods that require vacuum. Sec-
ond, indium tin oxide (ITO) is currently the most popular material
3. Electrohydrodynamic inkjet printing
as transparent electrodes for optoelectronic devices because of its
electrical conductivity and optical transparency. However, indium
As shown in Fig. 2, a direct E-jet printing system developed at
is a scarce resource on earth, and its mechanical fragility makes it
our lab was used in this paper. The E-jet printing system consists
hard to use for flexible electronic devices. As a result, the demand
of a three-axis stage, a dispensing system with pressure regulator,
for alternative electrodes that can replace ITO has been critical.
nozzle, and substrate. The three-axis stage can be programmed to
Many materials have been introduced, including carbon nanotubes
provide relative displacement in X-Y directions between substrates
[26–28], graphene [29,30], conducting polymers [31,32], and metal
and nozzle, simultaneously controlling plotting speed of nozzle and
nanoink. Among them, metal nanoink has drawn attention because
trajectory of tracks. Note that the fabrication process is capable of
of several advantages over other materials.
on demand printing multi-layers on substrate by programming the
Metals provide excellent conductivity among all other materials
movement of the 3-axis stage.
at room temperature due to their high free-electron density. At the
Conventional ink jet printing approaches are based on ther-
same time, ultra-thin and ultra-small metal patterns demonstrate
mal or acoustic formation and ejection of liquid droplets through
decent optical transparency at micro and nano scale. Transparent
nozzles [35]. The fabrication processes are successfully applied in
thin metal film and metal grids have been reported as a replacement
electronics, drug delivery systems [36], micromechanical devices
for ITO in optoelectronic devices in which light must pass through
[37,38] and other areas. The theoretical maximum resolution using
while current or voltage needs to be applied [33,34]. The properties
thermal or acoustic application is 20-30 ␮m, resulted from the
of these transparent metals are extremely important for device per-
fact that the diameters of the droplets are typically bigger than
formance. For example, the brittleness properties of electrodes are
10 ␮m[39]. Even though with assistant technique, e.g., by combing
crucial for flexible devices. The optical transparency and electrical
lithography into these ink jet printing to confine the liquid flow
resistance are another two important parameters. To achieve the
[40], it remains a challenge to for electronics research and industry
highest performance in optical transparency and resistance, metal-
community to achieve the sub-micrometer resolution in fabrication
based nanostructures need to be fabricated at micro scale while
process.
maintain their highest electrical conductivity at room temperature.
In our previous research presented in [41–43], we have
In this paper, we used silver nanoink for inkjet printing of electri-
demonstrated applying electrohydrodynamic inkjet printing (e-jet
cal patterns. The silver nanoink was from Advanced Nano Products
printing) to fabricate sub-20 ␮m conductive patterns on insulating
Co., Ltd. It is composed of silver nanoparticles with 20–35% in
substrates. In e-jet printing, we applied a voltage between noz-
weight, triethylene glycol with 65–80% in weight, and other small
zle and substrates. When a liquid is supplied to a sufficiently high
amounts of surfactants and lubricants to prevent agglomeration of
electrical potential, the liquid will form a stable cone and emits a
nanoparticles. Silver nanoparticles have diameters below 50 nm,
jet on its summit. The technique that uses electric fields instead
and they are uniformly dispersed in the solvent. The viscosity is
of thermal or acoustic offers some advantages of patterning com-
10–18 cP and surface tension is 35–38 dyn/cm. There are two sub-
pared with other direct write technologies. The dimension of the
strates used in the experiments, glass slides (75 mm * 25 mm *
jet generated by e-jet printing is much smaller than the dimension
1 mm) and highly insulating polyethylene terephthalate (PET) film,
of the nozzle, thus improving the resolution of printed patterns.
which are widely used for high density circuit, electronic packaging
In the study, three sets of experiments were conducted: (1)
and flexible electronics.
fabrication conditions and curing process, (2) investigation of

Please cite this article in press as: Qin H, et al. Fabrication and electrical characterization of multi-layer capacitive touch sensors on
flexible substrates by additive e-jet printing. J Manuf Process (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2017.04.015
G Model
JMP-635; No. of Pages 7 ARTICLE IN PRESS
4 H. Qin et al. / Journal of Manufacturing Processes xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

Fig. 3. (a) Nozzle applied in e-jet printing, (b) Printing condition: meniscus formed at the tip of nozzle to overcome surface tension because of electrical force, (c)(d) printed
patterns:100 ␮m square pads, 10 ␮m line width.

capacitive touch sensor in large-area scale for flexible electronics, process. In the experiments, the printed pattern on PET film were
(3) investigation of high-resolution printing and performance of cured at 100 ◦ C for 12 h before testing to ensure silver particles can
printed sensor array for droplet detection. form grain boundaries and good conductivity. From the table, the
resistivity of printed silver patterns was 9.48*10−2 * ␮m, around
6 times bulk silver. The line width and thickness of printed silver
4. Results and discussion pattern were both reduced during curing process because of shrink-
age, as shown in Fig. 4(b) and (c). The reason was that polymers and
4.1. High-resolution printing and multi-layer printing lubricant were removed, and voids between silver nanoparticles
were removed to form grain boundaries. A maximal 29.6% reduc-
Fig. 3(a) demonstrated the nozzle used in printing. The outside tion of cross–section area were observed in 10–layer sample at
diameter at the tip of the nozzle was 20 ␮m. At steady state after curing temperature of 200 ◦ C. But the resistance was tremendously
ink was supplied to the nozzle, surface tension of the ink prevented reduced because of improved resistivity.
droplet formation, as discussed in previous section. The applied Applying a 400 V AC voltage with frequency of 1kHz, the nozzle
voltage generated electric fields between nozzle and substrates. diameter was 20 ␮m. The comparison charts was shown in Table 1.
Once electrical force was greater than surface tension at the nee- By setting up voltage amplitude, frequency, plotting speeds, height
dle tip, droplets formed at the meniscus as shown in Fig. 3(b). The between nozzle and substrates, and curing temperature and time,
dimensions of printed patterns were much smaller than dimen- high resolution pattern with conductivity similar to bulk silver and
sions of the nozzle. Based on voltage applied, the nozzle/droplet better than ITO film can be achieved. For the following printing
ratio was from 7 to 2. The testing pattern printed was shown in process, over-lapping printing and multi-layer printing was applied
Fig. 3(c) and (d). The pads were 100 ␮m square for interconnector for both large-scale fabrication and high-resolution device testing.
with outside circuits. The line width was 10um shown as single
layer printing. The line length was 500 ␮m in Fig. 3(c) and 3.5mm
in Fig. 3(d) to demonstrate ability of the technique in both small
and large scale. 4.2. Sensitivity with finger touch
The conductivity of single layer printing wasn’t high enough for
sensor applications. There were two reasons for this insulating phe- We sampled the time constant with/without finger on the touch
nomena. First, single layer printing only generate line thickness of sensor to test its sensitivity for interaction with human fingers
45nm. The nanoparticles in silver ink has a diameter of 30–50nm, Fig. 5(a) shows response time with two finger touches and two
indicating there was only single particle layer printed on substrate, without touches in 200 sampling points. As we can see, there is
as shown in Fig. 2(a) and (b). There were inevitable voids between significant difference with/without finger on the touch sensor in
particles resulting in poor connectivity and conductivity. Second, terms of response time. The touch response can be further applied
the ink consisted of lubricants to avoid particles agglomeration. into electrical system design and circuit design. Our proposed touch
The nanoparticles also have polymer shells outside. Most of lubri- sensor can be further applied into touch screens, medical devices,
cants and polymers inside the ink need to be removed by curing etc.

Please cite this article in press as: Qin H, et al. Fabrication and electrical characterization of multi-layer capacitive touch sensors on
flexible substrates by additive e-jet printing. J Manuf Process (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2017.04.015
G Model
JMP-635; No. of Pages 7 ARTICLE IN PRESS
H. Qin et al. / Journal of Manufacturing Processes xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 5

Fig. 4. (a) Single-layer printing, (b) 30-layer printing before curing, (c) 30-layer printing after curing.

Table 1
Comparison charts of single-layer printing vs 30-layer printing, before and after curing process.

Before Curing After Curing

Width␮m Thicknessnm Resistivity˝* m Width␮m Thicknessnm Resistivity˝* m


Single-layer 8.621 45.113 N/A N/A N/A N/A
30-layer 14.728 364.325 N/A 13.949 274.556 9.48*10−2

Fig. 5. Response time with finger touch/not touch the sensor.

Fig. 5(b) revealed the capacitance change with finger approach- Fig. 7 demonstrated the stretchability test of the sensor proto-
ing the sensor from 10cm away until touching the sensor to type. As we can see from the Fig. 7(a), the resistivity maintained an
investigate the effect of interacting between finger and distance. average of 9.79*10−2 * ␮m and standard deviation of 0.008 dur-
As we can see from the figure, a shorter distance led to an obvi- ing the 100 times bending test, while the capacitance maintained
ous change in capacitance because of interception of electric field an average of 0.813pF and standard deviation of 0.333. The bending
due to finger approaching. There was a slightly capacitance distur- almost had no side effect on resistivity. Capacitance during bend-
bance after finger left the sensor in our setups. The reason was that ing demonstrated a slightly larger deviation. The reason was that
forces from finger touch were inevitable that deflected flexible sen- adhesion between multi-layer structures wasn’t strong enough in
sors. The distance between top and bottom electrodes was reduced the experiments. The adhesion analysis would be a future topic for
due to touching force. The presentence of finger dominated capaci- this research.
tance decrease by disturbing electric field. It also revealed that e-jet The response was almost simultaneous in the experiments.
printing may be further applied into stress sensor applications. In The key factor here was capacitance sensitivity. We applied four
our case, the capacitance sensor demonstrated its advantages that droplets on the intersection area of the prototype shown in Fig. 7(b).
it can detect object as long as they are in proximity. The changes of capacitance were shown in Fig. 7(b). At phase I, there
was no droplet. With each droplets falling on the intersection, an
obvious increase of capacitance change was observed.
4.3. High-resolution capacitance pattern for droplet detection Very few capacitance touch sensor can simultaneously achieve
good conductivity, high-resolution, high sensitivity, and good
Fig. 1 demonstrated one type of commercal layout for touch dis- stretchability. The rapid prototyping methods presented in the
play and touch sensor applications. In the stduy, high-resolution paper can also be adapted for curved substrates, which is another
sensor prototype was fabricated using e-jet printing on PET film, advantages over traditional lithography methods. With metal
as shown in Fig. 6(c). The width of electrodes was 20 ␮m in two ink used in the presented process, it can potentially be a good
separate layers. The fabricated sensor was bended for 100 times replacement for the traditional ITO film in current flexible display
in the experiment. Resistivity and capacitance of electrodes were technologies.
measured to test the stretchability. Water droplets was deposited We have demonstrated that e-jet printing using silver nano ink
onto intersection area shown in Fig. 6(b). Capacitance change due offers a lot more possibilities to meet customized needs in diverse
to presentence of water droplets were measured to test sensitivity applications.
of the sensor prototype.

Please cite this article in press as: Qin H, et al. Fabrication and electrical characterization of multi-layer capacitive touch sensors on
flexible substrates by additive e-jet printing. J Manuf Process (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2017.04.015
G Model
JMP-635; No. of Pages 7 ARTICLE IN PRESS
6 H. Qin et al. / Journal of Manufacturing Processes xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

Fig. 6. (a) (b) Schematic view of multi-layer electrodes array, (c) high-resolution capacitance touch sensor.

Fig. 7. (a) Stretchability test of sensor prototype, (b) Response of capacitance to water droplets.

Fig. 8. Printed microelectrodes array on PET film with (a) good transparency, (b) flexibility, and (c)(d) high resolution.

4.4. Rapid prototyping of microelectrodes array 5. Conclusions

To demonstrate the capability of e-jet printing as rapid proto- In this paper, the feasibility of rapid prototyping of capacitive
typing method, microelectrodes array on PET film were fabricated touch sensor on flexible substrates was investigated based on e-
with high resolution and transparency. We printed microelectrodes jet printing using silver nanoink. From 3D point of view, a high
array on PET film using the additive e-jet printing to demonstrate resolution humidity sensor was tested. Rapid prototyping of sub-
the capability and versatility of our proposed rapid prototyping 20 ␮m microelectrodes arrays using silver nanoink on PET film was
method. As shown in Fig. 8, we successfully printed high-resolution demonstrated.
microelectrodes array with dimension as small as 15 ␮m. The pat- The successfully developed rapid prototyping method shows
terns also demonstrated excellent transparency and flexibility on several distinct advantages and benefit to the community. It fills the
PET film using silver nanoink. The device we fabricated can be fur- gap between flexible electronics and rapid prototyping using metal
ther applied for micro capacitor, inducer, or as electrodes array for ink. The touch sensor demonstrated in the paper can be used as an
flexible displays. alternative to fragile ITO film used in current touch display. The
overall process is low cost, flexible, and avoid vacuum processing

Please cite this article in press as: Qin H, et al. Fabrication and electrical characterization of multi-layer capacitive touch sensors on
flexible substrates by additive e-jet printing. J Manuf Process (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2017.04.015
G Model
JMP-635; No. of Pages 7 ARTICLE IN PRESS
H. Qin et al. / Journal of Manufacturing Processes xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 7

environment. The presented touch sensor and its rapid prototyping [20] Barrett G, Omote R. Projected-capacitive touch technology. Inf Disp
method can be further applied in medical and display applications, 2010;26(3):16–21.
[21] Wong WS, Salleo A. Flexible electronics: materials and applications, vol. 11.
and it is also capable of on demand prototyping of any conductive Springer Science & Business Media; 2009.
patterns in flexible electronic manufacturing. [22] Chenchi L, Borkar MA, Redfern AJ, McClellan JH. Compressive sensing for sparse
touch detection on capacitive touch screens. emerging and selected topics in
circuits and systems. IEEE J 2012;2(3):639–48.
Acknowledgements [23] Tolmasky FR, Williamson R, Blumenberg C, Coffman PL, Portable multifunction
device, method, and graphical user interface for translating displayed content.
This work was partially supported by the National Science 2011, Google Patents.
[24] Qin H, Cai Y, Dong J, Lee Y-S. Direct printing of capacitive touch sensors on
Foundation (NSF) Grants (CMMI-1125872, CMMI-1404916 and flexible substrates by additive E-jet printing with silver nanoinks. J Manuf Sci
CMMI-1547105) to North Carolina State University. Their support Eng 2017;139(3):031011.
is greatly appreciated. [25] Qin H, Wei C, Dong J, Lee Y-S. Direct printing and electrical characterization of
conductive micro-slver tracks by alternating current-pulse modulated electro-
hydrodynamic jet printing. J Manuf Sci Eng 2017;139(2):021008.
References [26] Wu Z, Chen Z, Du X, Logan JM, Sippel J, Nikolou M, et al. Transparent: conductive
carbon nanotube films. Science 2004;305(5688):1273–6.
[1] Melzer M, Mönch JI, Makarov D, Zabila Y, Cañón Bermúdez GS, Karnaushenko [27] Zhang D, Ryu K, Liu X, Polikarpov E, Ly J, Tompson ME, et al. Transparent: con-
D, et al. Wearable magnetic field sensors for flexible electronics. Adv Mater ductive, and flexible carbon nanotube films and their application in organic
2015;27(7):1274–80. light-emitting diodes. Nano Lett 2006;6(9):1880–6.
[2] van den Brand J, de Kok M, Sridhar A, Cauwe M, Verplancke R, Bossuyt F, [28] Zhang M, Fang S, Zakhidov AA, Lee SB, Aliev AE, Williams CD, et al.
et al. Flexible and stretchable electronics for wearable healthcare. in solid state Strong: transparent, multifunctional, carbon nanotube sheets. Science
device research conference (ESSDERC). In: 2014 44th European. 2014. 2014. 2005;309(5738):1215–9.
[3] Chang HC, Liu CL, Chen WC. Flexible nonvolatile transistor memory devices [29] Kim KS, Zhao Y, Jang H, Lee SY, Kim JM, Kim KS, et al. Large-scale pat-
based on one-dimensional electrospun P3HT: Au hybrid nanofibers. Adv Funct tern growth of graphene films for stretchable transparent electrodes. Nature
Mater 2013;23(39):4960–8. 2009;457(7230):706–10.
[4] Lin KL, Jain K. Design and fabrication of stretchable multilayer self-aligned [30] Wu J, Agrawal M, Becerril HA, Bao Z, Liu Z, Chen Y, et al. Organic light-
interconnects for flexible electronics and large-area sensor arrays using emitting diodes on solution-processed graphene transparent electrodes. ACS
excimer laser photoablation. Electron Dev Lett IEEE 2009;30(1):14–7. Nano 2009;4(1):43–8.
[5] Kaltenbrunner M, White MS, Głowacki ED, Sekitani T, Someya T, Sariciftci NS, [31] Huang J-H, Kekuda D, Chu C-W, Ho K-C. Electrochemical characterization of the
et al. Ultrathin and lightweight organic solar cells with high flexibility. Nat solvent-enhanced conductivity of poly (3: 4-ethylenedioxythiophene) and its
Commun 2012;3:770. application in polymer solar cells. J Mater Chem 2009;19(22):3704–12.
[6] Leonat L, White MS, Głowacki ED, Scharber MC, Zillger T, Rühling J, [32] Yoo JE, Lee KS, Garcia A, Tarver J, Gomez ED, Baldwin K, et al. Directly pattern-
et al. 4% efficient polymer solar cells on paper substrates. J Phys Chem C able: highly conducting polymers for broad applications in organic electronics.
2014;118(30):16813–7. Proc Natl Acad Sci 2010;107(13):5712–7.
[7] Kim K-S, Bang J-O, Jung S-B. Electrochemical migration behavior of silver [33] Meiss J, Riede M, Leo K. Towards efficient tin-doped indium oxide (ITO)-
nanopaste screen-printed for flexible and printable electronics. Curr Appl Phys free inverted organic solar cells using metal cathodes. Appl Phys Lett
2013;13:S190–4. 2009;94(1):013303.
[8] Lee S, Jeon S, Chaji R, Nathan A. Transparent semiconducting oxide technology [34] O’Connor B, Haughn C, An K-H, Pipe KP, Shtein M. Transparent and con-
for touch free interactive flexible displays. Proc. IEEE 2015;103(4):644–64. ductive electrodes based on unpatterned, thin metal films. Appl Phys Lett
[9] Mariotti C, Su W, Cook BS, Roselli L, Tentzeris MM. Development of low cost: 2008;93(22):223304.
wireless, inkjet printed microfluidic RF systems and devices for sensing or [35] Parashkov R, Becker E, Riedl T, Johannes H-H, Kowalsky W. Large area electron-
tunable. Sensors J IEEE 2015;15(6):3156–63. ics using printing methods. Proc IEEE 2005;93(7):1321–9.
[10] Espinosa N, Hösel M, Angmo D, Krebs FC. Solar cells with one-day energy pay- [36] Heller MJ. DNA microarray technology: devices, systems, and applications.
back for the factories of the future. Energy Environ Sci 2012;5(1):5117–32. Annu Rev Biomed Eng 2002;4(1):129–53.
[11] Eltaib M, Hewit J. Tactile sensing technology for minimal access surgery––a [37] Bietsch A, Zhang J, Hegner M, Lang HP, Gerber C. Rapid functionalization of
review. Mechatronics 2003;13(10):1163–77. cantilever array sensors by inkjet printing. Nanotechnology 2004;15(8):873.
[12] Walker G. A review of technologies for sensing contact location on the surface [38] Wang Z, Shang H, Lee GU. Nanoliter-scale reactor arrays for biochemical sens-
of a display. J Soc Inf Disp 2012;20(8):413–40. ing. Langmuir 2006;22(16):6723–6.
[13] Kyberd PJ, Chappell PH. Characterization of an optical and acoustic touch and [39] Park J-U, Hardy M, Kang SJ, Barton K, Adair K, Kishore Mukhopad-
slip sensor for autonomous manipulation. Meas Sci Technol 1992;3(10):969. hyay D, et al. High-resolution electrohydrodynamic jet printing. Nat Mater
[14] Lee MH, Nicholls HR. Review article tactile sensing for mechatronics—a state 2007;6(10):782–9.
of the art survey. Mechatronics 1999;9(1):1–31. [40] Stutzmann N, Friend RH, Sirringhaus H. Self-aligned: vertical-channel, polymer
[15] Phares R, Fihn M. Introduction to touchscreen technologies. Handb Visual Disp field-effect transistors. Science 2003;299(5614):1881–4.
Technol 2012:935–74. [41] Qin H, Dong J, Lee Y-S. AC-pulse modulated electrohydrodynamic jet print-
[16] Elbuken C, Glawdel T, Chan D, Ren CL. Detection of microdroplet size and speed ing and electroless copper deposition for conductive microscale patterning on
using capacitive sensors. Sensors Actuators A: Phys 2011;171(2):55–62. flexible insulating substrates. Rob Comp-Integr Manuf 2015.
[17] Shim J-H, Lee J-S, Kim JY, Cho D-W. Bioprinting of a mechanically enhanced [42] Qin H, Wei C, Dong J, Lee Y-S. Direct printing and electrical characterization of
three-dimensional dual cell-laden construct for osteochondral tissue engineer- conductive micro silver tracks by AC-pulse modulated electrohydrodynamic
ing using a multi-head tissue/organ building system. J Micromech Microeng jet (E-Jet) printing. J Manuf Sci Eng 2016.
2012;22(8):085014. [43] Wei C, Qin H, Ramírez-Iglesias NA, Chiu C-P, Lee Y-s, Dong J. High-resolution
[18] de Gans BJ, Duineveld PC, Schubert US. Inkjet printing of polymers: state of the ac-pulse modulated electrohydrodynamic jet printing on highly insulating sub-
art and future developments. Adv Mater 2004;16(3):203–13. strates. J Micromech Microeng 2014;24(4):045010, p.
[19] Lee D, Hwang E, Yu T, Kim Y, Hwang J. Structuring of micro line conductor using
electro-hydrodynamic printing of a silver nanoparticle suspension. Appl Phys
A 2006;82(4):671–4.

Please cite this article in press as: Qin H, et al. Fabrication and electrical characterization of multi-layer capacitive touch sensors on
flexible substrates by additive e-jet printing. J Manuf Process (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmapro.2017.04.015

You might also like