Effect of hydrophobic microstructured surfaces on conductive ink printing

Abstract

Conductive ink was printed on various microstructured substrates to measure the printing quality. Poly-dimethylsiloxane (PDMS) substrates were used to test the printability of the hydrophobic surface material. Microstructured arrays of 10 mu m regular PDMS cubes were prepared using the MEMS fabrication technique. The gap distance between the cubes was varied from 10 to 40 mu m. The printing wettability of the microstructured surfaces was determined by measuring the contact angle of a droplet of silver conductive ink. Screen-printing methods were used in the conductive line printing experiment. Test line patterns with finely varying widths (30-250 mu m) were printed repeatedly, and the conductivity of the printed lines was measured. The printability, which was defined as the ratio of the successfully printed patterns to the total number of printed patterns, was analyzed as a function of the linewidth and the gap distance of the microstructured surfaces.