Effect of Thickness on Surface Morphology of Silver Nanoparticle Layer During Furnace Sintering

Abstract

In printed electronics applications, specific resistances of conductive lines are critical to the performance of the devices. The specific resistance of a silver (Ag) nanoparticle electrode is affected by surface morphology of the layered nanoparticles which were sintered by the heat treatment after printing. In this work, the relationship between surface morphology and specific resistance was investigated with various sintering temperatures and various layer thicknesses of Ag nanoparticle ink. Ag nanoparticles with an average size of approximately 50 nm were spin-coated on Eagle XG glass substrates with various spin speed to change the layer thickness of Ag nanoparticles from 200 nm to 900 nm. Coated Ag nanoparticle layers were heated from 150°C to 450°C for 30 min in a furnace. The result showed that higher sintering temperature produces larger grains in an Ag layer and decreases specific resistance of the layer, but that the maximum allowable heating temperature is limited by the thickness of the layer. When grain size exceeded the thickness of the layer, the morphology of the Ag nanoparticles changed to submicron-sized islands and the Ag layers did not have electrical conductivity any more.