Laser‐Activated Selective Electroless Plating on 3D Structures via Additive Manufacturing for Customized Electronics

Abstract

This work proposes a facile and economical hybrid additive manufacturing (HAM)technology combining fused deposition modeling (FDM) 3D printing and laser‐activated selective electroless plating (ELP) for fabricating full functional end‐use 3D customized electronics. A functional acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) filament doped with dicopper hydroxide phosphate (Cu2(OH)PO4) catalysts is developed for FDM 3D printing. The 3D printed structure is selectively laser‐activated to generate CuI plating seeds on the ABS surface and then electrolessly plated. The poor surface finish, especially the layer lines, is an intrinsic defect of extrusion 3D printing, which not only affected the fabrication quality of the 3D substrates but also the electrical performance of the attached circuitry. Herein, a chemical polishing process based on acetone vapor is explored and characterized to significantly improve the surface quality and thereby the electrical performance of the attached copper layer. In this way, highly conductive metallic circuitry can be freeformly deposited and patterned on the 3D structure which is extremely attractive for customized 3D electronics. To show the application potential of this technology, a 3D conformal 555 timer astable oscillator circuit board and a hot‐wire flowmeter are developed as demonstrators.

Embedded Sensors with 3D Printing Technology: Review

“…Using DLP and ELP procedures to deposit metal layers on the micro-lattice, Shin et al increased the lattice’s compressive rigidity from 8.8 MPa to 11.1 MPa [ 103 ]. To fabricate high-resolution 3D conformal/embedded circuit boards, sensors, antennas, etc., Liu et al integrated laser-activated ELP with a variety of AM technologies [ 104 , 105 , 106 , 107 , 108 ].…”

Floatable Cu2(OH)PO4/rGO Aerogel for Full Spectrum Driven Photocatalytic Degradation of Organic Pollutants

“…Designing a heterostructure system with a wide light-absorption range and efficient charge carrier mobility is essential for achieving full spectrum solar light utilization . From the aspect of light absorption, narrow bandgap semiconductors such as Cu 2 (OH)­PO 4 , Cu 2 S, Ag 2 S, and BiWO 6 with NIR response are promising to achieve full spectrum absorption. Unfortunately, narrow bandgap semiconductors suffer from low carrier separation efficiency and short carrier lifetime due to the limitation of Coulombic interactions between electrons and holes, limiting the light utilization efficiency. , Very recently, low-dimensional heterostructures including 0D/2D, 1D/2D, and 2D/2D systems , have gained popularity due to the short-range interfacial interaction of two low-dimensional materials, which can promote electronic coupling and electron transfer.…”

Smart Lattice Structures with Self-Sensing Functionalities via Hybrid Additive Manufacturing Technology

“…Our group combined laser activated ELP with various AM technologies for the fabrication of high-resolution 3D conformal/embedded circuit boards, sensors, antennas, etc. [ 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 ].…”