Reversible polymer-gel transition for ultra-stretchable chip-integrated circuits through self-soldering and self-coating and self-healing

Pedro Alhais Lopes, Bruno C. Santos, Anibal T. Almeida and Mahmoud Tavakoli ()
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Pedro Alhais Lopes: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Coimbra
Bruno C. Santos: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Coimbra
Anibal T. Almeida: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Coimbra
Mahmoud Tavakoli: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Coimbra

Nature Communications, 2021, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-10

Abstract: Abstract Integration of solid-state microchips into soft-matter, and stretchable printed electronics has been the biggest challenge against their scalable fabrication. We introduce, Pol-Gel, a simple technique for self-soldering, self-encapsulation, and self-healing, that allows low cost, scalable, and rapid fabrication of hybrid microchip-integrated ultra-stretchable circuits. After digitally printing the circuit, and placing the microchips, we trigger a Polymer-Gel transition in physically cross-linked block copolymers substrate, and silver liquid metal composite ink, by exposing the circuits to the solvent vapor. Once in the gel state, microchips penetrate to the ink and the substrate (Self-Soldering), and the ink penetrates to the substrate (Self-encapsulation). Maximum strain tolerance of ~1200% for printed stretchable traces, and >500% for chip-integrated soft circuits is achieved, which is 5x higher than the previous works. We demonstrate condensed soft-matter patches and e-textiles with integrated sensors, processors, and wireless communication, and repairing of a fully cut circuits through Pol-Gel.

Date: 2021
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-25008-5

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