Journal
ACS APPLIED MATERIALS & INTERFACES
Volume 10, Issue 18, Pages 15841-15846Publisher
AMER CHEMICAL SOC
DOI: 10.1021/acsami.8b01455
Keywords
3D printer; MEMS; switches; thermoplastic; water-soluble
Funding
- National Research Foundation (NRF) of Korea [2016R1A2B4011366, 2016R1A5A1012966]
- Future Semiconductor Device Technology Development Program - MOTIE (Ministry of Trade, Industry Energy) [10067739]
- KSRC (Korea Semiconductor Research Consortium)
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Three-dimensional (3D) printers have attracted considerable attention from both industry and academia and especially in recent years because of their ability to overcome the limitations of two-dimensional (2D) processes and to enable large-scale facile integration techniques. With 3D printing technologies, complex structures can be created using only a computer-aided design file as a reference; consequently, complex shapes can be manufactured in a single step with little dependence on manufacturer technologies. In this work, we provide a first demonstration of the facile and time-saving 3D printing of two-terminal micro-electromechanical (MEM) switches. Two widely used thermoplastic materials were used to form 3D-printed MEM switches; freely suspended and fixed electrodes were printed from conductive polylactic acid, and a water-soluble sacrificial layer for air-gap formation was printed from poly(vinyl alcohol). Our 3D-printed MEM switches exhibit excellent electromechanical properties, with abrupt switching characteristics and an excellent on/off current ratio value exceeding 10(6). Therefore, we believe that our study makes an innovative contribution with implications for the development of a broader range of 3D printer applications (e.g., the manufacturing of various MEM devices and sensors), and the work highlights a uniquely attractive path toward the realization of 3D-printed electronics.
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