P‐239: Late‐News Poster: Modeling Particle Deposition in Evaporating Colloidal Droplets

Abstract

Inkjet printing is a cost‐effective method of particle deposition applicable, for example, in the manufacture of Quantum Dot (QD) color filters. However, it is a challenge to achieve uniform deposition of particles because evaporating colloidal dispersions are prone to the coffee‐ring effect.When the particle size is small, it is difficult to gauge directly by experiment how particles migrate during the evaporation process. Consequently, it is a challenge to optimize the process conditions to improve uniformity by experiment alone. To aid in this task, we have developed a simulator for colloidal droplet evaporation. Rather than use an effective particle concentration field as in previous works, motion of each individual particle is calculated by Stokesian Dynamics, with particle interactions governed by the DLVO theory. In order to facilitate the simulation of large collections of particles, GPU computing is applied to reduce the simulation time.A phase‐field approach is taken to capture the interface physics at the solvent‐air interface. Within a colloidal droplet we find that, by controlling the temperature, it is possible to promote Marangoni flow and, in turn, improve deposition uniformity. In future, we aim to use simulation to further optimize the process conditions, such as the chamber pressure and temperature, in order maximize uniformity.