NovaCentrix Blog

An introduction to a new application from NovaCentrix with guiding questions for collaborators and customers...

NovaCentrix continues to bring new technologies to the printed electronics market to enable new structures and patterns that were previously considered unfeasible, too costly or impossible to manufacture. In this blog post we introduce the reader to PulseForge® Printing, a novel new way for contactless printing of a wide range of materials. This technology uses the capabilities developed in the PulseForge light source to instantaneously heat an ink loaded in a patterned plate. On heating, the ink is ejected from the plate and onto a target substrate – transferring the pattern. Our patterned plate gives the printer the ability to make very high resolution (< 25 µm), high aspect ratio (~ 1 for a single print), and multi-height prints out of a wide range of materials. Our PulseForge tool set gives the process high throughput, high duty cycle, repeatability, and uniformity. Common initial questions are outlined in this post with our answers to initiate a discussion around what this technology is capable of. Please connect with our team to learn more and engage on specific projects that could benefit from the capabilities of our new PulseForge Printing application.

PulseForge Lift-Off: A Flashlamp Lift-Off Process

• What is PulseForge® Lift-Off (PFLO)? How is it used in industry?

PulseForge Lift-Off (PFLO) is a flashlamp based lift-off process developed by NovaCentrix to address the industrial need to rapidly and economically release polymeric films  from rigid glass carriers. Developed as a laser lift-off (LLO) alternative, some of the advantages of PFLO include: (1) Enabling higher throughput by large-area illumination of the substrates as opposed to highly localized illumination in LLO process. (2) Light absorber on glass carrier increases process reliability and yield by ensuring no direct illumination of the polymeric film and the device stack. (3) Resiliency to pinholes and particle defects on the polymeric film coating as the film does not see any illumination.

Some industries that use PFLO are flexible display manufacturing, flexible sensors and batteries manufacturing, thin silicon wafer debonding in multi-layered 3D chip packages, and in other light-weight electronics packaging applications.

When I write about printed electronics, I tend to focus on the “electronics” a lot more than the “printed.” For this blog entry, I’m going to try to do just the opposite.  

With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the need for general-purpose antiviral materials has never been more relevant. Metallic nanoparticles, and silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) in particular, have received considerable attention through efforts to meet this need. But what is it that makes AgNPs effective against viruses? How has this effectiveness been measured and quantified? And how can AgNPs be incorporated into products and treatments effectively? Answers to these questions provided by the scientific community are invaluable for separating the facts from the hype.

How Does the Photonic Curing Process Work?

Light energy incident on a body will be absorbed and heat up the object. The light-matter interaction determines what fraction of light is reflected back, transmitted through or absorbed by the body. The fraction of light absorbed can be guessed by the color of the body (darker material absorbs more light). Light that is absorbed by the body is mostly converted to heat and shows up as an increase in its temperature. That’s why wearing a black shirt in the middle of a Texas summer isn’t the most comfortable thing to do.

Current Material Options

If you have ever disassembled any electronic device, you know that inside you’ll find a variety of components, such as resistors, capacitors, chips and controllers that make everything work. All of these components usually sit on a rigid board (with copper tracks on it) that allows these parts to talk to one another. A major consideration in the choice of materials for building conventional electronics is the material’s ability to withstand high temperature (a required step in building electronic devices). But if those high thermal requirements could be relaxed, it would open up a wide variety of material options which, in turn, would allow new forms and functionalities – while reducing unit costs.