The effect of oxidation concentration on the adhesion between flexible substrate and metal layer in metal transfer process using UV curable polymer

Abstract

There has been a recent trend towards the application of transfer processes to produce an electric circuit on a flexible polymer substrate. However, adhesion between the circuit layer and the target substrate in the transfer process is typically insufficient due to non-conformal contact between two layers or low-surface energy of the target substrate. To solve this problem, ultraviolet (UV) curable resin was proposed as an adhesive layer between the circuit layer and the polymer substrate. This study experimentally analyzed the effect of oxidation concentration on the adhesion between a substrate and metal layer in metal transfer process using UV curable polymer. We also demonstrated that controlling the degree of cure of acrylate UV-curable resin, which varies depending on the oxygen concentration of the atmosphere, was shown to be an effective method to improve adhesion to the polymer substrate and prevent metal patterns from being damaged in the transfer process by adjusting the oxygen concentration under atmospheric conditions. As a feasibility study on the transfer process for actual electronic devices, a metal pattern for RTD (resistance temperature detector) was transferred on a polymer film and characterized with the electrical resistance of the pattern.