Rapid Low-pressure Plasma Sintering of Inkjet Printed Silver Nanoparticles for the Production of RFID Antennas

Wolf, Franziska; Perelaer, Jolke; Stumpf, Steffi; Bollen, Dirk; Kriebel, Frank; Schubert, Ulrich S.
Abstract:
A rapid low-pressure plasma sintering process of inkjet-printed silver nanoparticles is reported, yielding a conductivity of 11.4% of bulk silver within 1 min of plasma exposure and a final conductivity up to 40% of bulk silver for longer sintering times. The maximum processing temperature did not exceed 70 °C, which enabled the use of cost-effective polyethylene terephthalate (PET) foils. Fully functional radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags were prepared with inkjet-printed antennas, which showed similar results as screen-printed devices. The inkjet-printed antennas require significantly less materials, hence thinner layers, than the screen-printed references.
Year:
2013
Type of Publication:
Article
Journal:
Journal of Materials Research
Volume:
28
Pages:
1254 - 1261