Product Code: ICAL05_M706

Laser Sintering of Silver Nano-Particle Inks Deposited by Direct Write Technology
Authors:
Jacob Colvin, South Dakota School of Mines & Technology; Rapid City South Dakota USA
Oleg Starovoytov, South Dakota School of Mines & Technology; Rapid City South Dakota USA
James Sears, South Dakota School of Mines & Technology; Rapid City SD USA
Jan Puszynski, South Dakota School of Mines & Technology; Rapid City South Dakota USA
Michael Carter, South Dakota School of Mines & Technology; Rapid City South Dakota USA
Presented at ICALEO 2005

Direct Write Technologies are being used in antennas, engineered structures, sensors, and tissue engineering. Many for the precursors materials used as inks and pastes for the Direct Write technologies are comprised of nano-scale particles (i.e., Ag, Au, Pt). Various formulations are used to carry the nano-particles during the Direct Write processing. The Direct Write processes delivers these inks and pastes to a surface were they are then post processed to form a functional device. Laser sintering is one form of thermal post processing that can performed on these deposited nano-particles.

This paper will report on the results obtained after laser sintering several different sources of silver nano-particle inks with a 2W frequency doubled Nd:YAG laser. The results are quantified in terms of surface resistivity, electrical conductivity, elastic modulus, and microstructure.