Laser patterning of thin films is used to create conducting and/or isolating paths in coated and multilayer materials.
A range of techniques are employed to achieve the required result, whether that be to write electrical circuits in a metal-coated substrate, isolate areas of a transparent conducting oxide (TCO), or create conductive paths in printed layers or coatings that contain conducting particles.
Laser patterning offers a number of distinct advantages over other techniques:
- Versatility in the ability to address a range of conducting, insulating, semiconductor, and hybrid materials
- Ultra-fine feature size with track or feature widths down to a few microns
- Direct writing capability, avoiding the need for masks, and wet post-processing
- Ability to pattern 2D and 3D materials and components (including cylinders, spheres, and complex surfaces)
- Ability to register to existing features using vision systems for accurate alignment without the need for mechanical referencing
- Ability to tune a conduction channel to optimize electrical performance
- Ability to make or break electrical continuity (in the appropriate materials)
- Precision targeting of micron-scale feature enabling hard coding of printed logic
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