Manufacturing USA: Precision Alignment of Roll-to-Roll Printing of Flexible Paper Electronics Through Modeling and Virtual Sensor-based Control

对先进制造技术的需求正在增加，这些技术可以准确和高速地打印电子产品。可将印刷的电子图案连续地转移到柔性基板上的卷对卷印刷技术对于柔性电子器件的大批量生产是非常有前途的。然而，存在需要克服的重大挑战，这是多层印刷电子器件具有非常严格的对准公差要求，并且没有可靠的工具可用于实时监测和控制重叠配准精度。为了克服这一挑战，该奖项使用建模和基于虚拟传感器的控制开发了卷对卷印刷的精确对准。另一个挑战是大量使用塑料作为基材，塑料是由石油基材料制成的，因此不能生物降解，这使得它们的生产和处置对环境有害。为了应对这些挑战，该奖项将纸质基材作为柔性电子产品塑料的可回收和环保替代品。这个跨学科的项目超越了几个重要领域的界限，包括先进材料工程，网络制造和数据分析。从该项目中获得的知识有助于催化纳米和微米增材打印的新技术，这些技术将进入美国制造研究所的创新管道。这项研究的成果有利于下一代生态友好的柔性电子产品，例如用于患者护理的更环保的一次性传感器或更低成本的嵌入式家用电子产品。教育活动促进跨学科的顶点项目，增加学生？在制造业研究方面的实践学习经验。该项目的目标是促进对功能性纸质电子产品的卷对卷（R2 R）印刷的基本理解。该研究涉及了解空间变异产生及其传播和积累的机制。关于空间误差传播的知识用于开发虚拟传感，以实现对多层微结构的创建、集成和操作的前所未有的控制，这些微结构构成了印刷纸电子的基础。此外，本项目还研究了闭环方法中材料-过程-控制-设备性能之间的关系。这项研究加快了智能R2 R系统的发展，具有高可追溯性，可预测性和可控性，可用于柔性纸质电子产品的高分辨率增材打印，从而实现了传感，生物医学设备和可再生能源等一系列技术。R2 R纸上印刷电子产品的发展开创了环保、柔性纸质设备的新时代，如一次性价格的水质传感器。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Demand is increasing for advanced manufacturing technologies that can print electronics accurately and at high speed. Roll-to-Roll printing techniques that can continuously transfer a printed electronic pattern onto a flexible substrate are very promising for high-volume production of flexible electronic devices. However, there is a significant challenge to overcome, which is that multilayer printed electronics have very tight alignment tolerance requirements, and there are no reliable tools available to monitor and control the overlay registration accuracy in real-time. To overcome this challenge, this award develops precision alignment of roll-to-roll printing using modeling and virtual sensor-based control. Another challenge is the overwhelming use of plastic as the substrate, which are manufactured from petroleum-based materials and therefore are not biodegradable, making them environmentally hazardous to produce and dispose. To address these challenges, this award pursues paper substrates as recyclable and environmentally friendly alternatives to plastic for flexible electronics. This interdisciplinary project transcends the boundaries of several important fields, including advanced materials engineering, cyber-manufacturing and data analytics. The knowledge attained from this project helps catalyze new technologies in nano and micro additive printing that feed into the innovation pipelines of the Manufacturing USA Institutes. The outcomes of this research benefit next-generation ecologically-friendly flexible electronics, such as, greener disposable sensors for patient care or lower-cost embedded home electronics. Educational activities promote interdisciplinary capstone projects and increase students? hands-on learning experience in manufacturing research. This supports the nationwide effort in educating the next generation manufacturing engineers.The goal of this project is to advance the fundamental understanding of roll-to-roll (R2R) printing of functional paper electronics. The study involves understanding the mechanism for spatial variation generation and its propagation and accumulation. The knowledge on spatial error propagation is used to develop virtual sensing to achieve unprecedented control in the creation, integration and manipulation of multilayer microstructures that form the foundation of printed paper electronics. Furthermore, this project studies materials-process-control-device performance relationships in a closed loop approach. This research expedites intelligent R2R systems with high traceability, predictability and controllability for high-resolution additive printing of flexible paper electronics, enabling a host of technologies spanning sensing, biomedical devices, and renewable energy. The development of R2R printing of electronics on paper ushers in a new era of environmentally-friendly, flexible paper devices such as water quality sensors at throwaway prices.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.