Advancing printed electronics and materials with lab-on-a-printer technology

近年来，印刷电子产品的总体领域增长非常迅速。全球市场估计为240亿美元，预计到2030年将增长到3400亿美元，到2020年加拿大的份额将达到12亿美元。拟议研究计划的长期目标是开发具有从根本上加速印刷电子发展的潜力的新知识、技术、技术和材料。 开发新的可打印电子设备最重要的挑战之一是工艺参数、材料组成和几何形状以复杂和非线性的方式耦合，影响结构、功能、性能、耐用性、灵活性和寿命。溶剂挥发的性质、颗粒或单体的自组装、层间溶剂相互作用和干燥结构中的液体动力学等方面都对形态、结构和最终性能有影响。因此，我们发现，由于工艺条件的微小变化，电子和光学性质存在根本性的差异。 组合测试和优化的应用，这是一种经验方法，通过制造和测试许多器件变体来探索这些复杂的设计空间，直到最近才被考虑。目前的印刷平台不是为了经济地应用这一方法而开发的，因此报告的例子很少。我们现在才能通过基础研究和开发基于PI实验室正在探索的实验室打印机(LOP)技术的有针对性的组合测试和优化平台来实现这一能力及其好处。能够进行这项研究的关键特征是，这些LOP系统具有提供对印刷结构的几何形状和组成的软件控制的独特能力，允许在一个步骤中快速制造具有结构和组成变化的复杂器件变体。 由这项拟议的发现拨款支持的研究计划将使我们对印刷电子技术的基本方面的理解取得突破。这项研究的目标是：(1)了解印刷电子制造和功能所涉及的基本机制和工艺；(2)探索基于组合器件测试和优化的加速印刷设备开发的技术；(3)推进实验性的打印机实验室平台技术；(4)展示和验证这些方法在印刷高迁移率碳纳米管晶体管和化学微传感器上的应用，这些方法具有实现印刷电子技术重大性能突破的潜力。

The general area of printed electronics has grown very rapidly in recent years. The global market is estimated at $24B and expected to grow to $340B by 2030 with Canada's share at $1.2B by 2020. The long-term objectives of the proposed research program are to develop new knowledge, technology, techniques, and materials that hold the potential to fundamentally accelerate the development of printed electronics. One of the most important challenges in developing a new printable electronic device is that processing parameters, material composition, and geometry are coupled in complex and non-linear ways to affect structure, function, performance, durability, flexibility, and lifetime. Aspects such as the nature of solvent evaporation, self-assembly of particles or monomers, interlayer solvent interactions, and liquid dynamics in drying structures all contribute to morphology, structure, and ultimately performance. As a consequence, we find radical differences in electronic and optical properties for small changes in the process conditions. The application of combinatorial testing and optimization, an empirical method whereby many device variants are fabricated and tested to explore these complex design spaces has only recently been considered. Current printing platforms are not developed to apply this methodology economically and as a consequence there are very few reported examples. We are only now able to realize this capacity and its benefits through fundamental research and development of a targeted combinatorial testing and optimization platform based on the lab-on-a-printer (LOP) technology being explored in the lab of the PI. The key feature enabling this proposed research is that these LOP systems have the unique capability of providing software control over both the geometry and composition of the printed structure, allowing for rapid fabrication of complex device variants with both structural and compositional changes in one step. The research program to be supported by this proposed Discovery Grant will enable breakthroughs in our understanding of fundamental aspects of printed electronics technology. The objectives of the research are to: (1) understand the fundamental mechanisms and processes involved in the fabrication and function of printed electronics; (2) explore techniques to accelerate printed device development based on combinatorial device testing and optimization; (3) advance the experimental lab-on-a-printer platform technology, and (4) demonstrate and validate these approaches on printed high mobility carbon nanotube transistor and chemical microsensors that hold the potential to realize significant performance breakthroughs in printed electronics.