Send link
European POLARIC project is revolutionising production of organic electronic circuits
10.03.2010
A new EU-funded project POLARIC was launched in January 2010 to develop roll-to-roll printing of high-performance organic electronic circuits. The project will revolutionise the way printed electronic circuits are made by combining large-area fabrication methods with high-performance organic electronic circuits on a scale not previously attempted.
So far the appearance of organic thin film transistors and circuits in
industrial products has been limited. The main obstacle for substantial market
penetration of such organic electronic components has been the inability to
achieve the necessary device performance combined with the necessary
high-volume production methods.
In response to this, the
POLARIC project “Printed, Organic and Large-Area Realisation of Integrated
Circuits” aims to revolutionise the way printed electronic circuits are made.
This will be done by combining large-area fabrication methods with
high-performance organic electronic circuits on a scale not previously
attempted. The high performance of the organic circuits referred to here means
high speed (kHz-MHz range), low operating voltage (below 5 V), low power
consumption, and low parasitic capacitance. At the same time, the
manufacturing process will be focused to produce components and circuits with
extremely high yield using large-area compatible, high-volume methods.
To
achieve these goals, the POLARIC project will develop further roll-to-roll
(R2R) printing methods, e.g. R2R compatible nanoimprinting technologies for
short channel configuration of the electrodes. Proper material selection will
lead to high performance complementary circuit devices. The POLARIC project
will also provide solutions for the fabrication of R2R tools in order to make
serial replication viable. Finally, the circuit design, modelling, and
characterisation of organic electronics will be developed to offer a toolbox
similar to that of silicon-based microelectronics.
After the
project, high-performing organic electronic building blocks and manufacturing
platforms can be used in all areas of printed electronics such as sensors,
memories, batteries, photovoltaics, lighting and any combination of these
devices.
As a large-scale strategic project, POLARIC includes
a large amount of dissemination activities, key personnel and student
exchange, training, and networking activities.
The European
Union funds the 48-month POLARIC project with 9.9 Million euros and the work
is divided between 13 partners from 7 different countries. The partners are
VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland (the coordinator, Finland),
3D-Micromac (Germany), AMO (Germany), BASF (Switzerland), CSEM (Switzerland),
Cardiff University (UK), Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft IZM (Germany), IMEC
(Belgium), Imperial College London (UK), Joanneum Research (Austria), micro
resist technology (Germany), Obducat Technologies (Sweden), and Asulab, a
division of The Swatch Group Research and Development Ltd. (Switzerland).
FIGURE CAPTION
The
figure compares the POLARIC target to the current state-of-the-art in organic
electronics.
Web site of the POLARIC project:
www.polaricproject.eu