Interfacial-Force-Controlled Placing Technique of Microstructures of Sub- to One Hundred Micrometer Size Using Blade Coating

Abstract

The surface mounting technology of electronic devices using pick-and-place machines is commonly used to fabricate functional electronic appliances, such as motherboards, flat panel displays, and mobile phones. However, the pick-and-place method begins to encounter difficulties in mounting electronic devices when devices shrink to a few hundreds of micrometers or less. We propose a new blade-coating method of placing microstructures smaller than several hundreds of micrometers on a substrate. The method comprises three steps: (1) preparing a microstructure dispersion consisting of chemically modified microstructures and a water-insoluble organic solvent, (2) continuous blade-coating of water and the dispersion on a chemically patterned substrate on which hydrophilic areas are surrounded by a hydrophobic self-assembled monolayer, and (3) spontaneous placing of the microstructures on the hydrophilic areas by a water/solvent interfacial force that acts on the microstructures. Using this method, we have been able to place microstructures ranging in length from submicrometer to one hundred micrometers, including silicon nanowires and SiO2 microstructures of various sizes. However, our blade-coating method for placing microstructures can be realized with successful combinations of chemical modifiers for the microstructures and water-insoluble solvents. We present a simple method of assessing dispersion using a chemically modified glass test tube filled with water and a solvent for the dispersion.