Kaihao Zhang

Transfer Printing Technologies and Applications, 369-418, Elsevier, 2024

Abstract

The fabrication of ultrathin metal films is decisive in enormous fields such as microelectronic devices, plasmonics, and biosciences. Prevalent lithographic methods were principally designed to form patterns on ultraflat semiconductor surfaces. However, high costs and intricate processes are needed to adapt these lithographic methods to emerging applications like flexible electronics fabrication. Over the past decades, soft lithography techniques and relevant microcontact and nanotransfer printing processes have rapidly developed and are widely utilized in large-area metal film patterning and transfer with high fidelity and nanoscale resolution. This chapter introduces advances that employ a stamp with specially tailored surface structures and chemistries to pattern ultrathin metal films on various substrates, including metals, semiconductors, and polymers. Critical steps such as metallization, surface treatment, film/substrate delamination, bonding mechanics, and high-throughput and precise contact printing processes will be discussed. Further, we overview the mechanical behaviors of metal films bonded on the elastomeric substrates.