title: A Study of the Preparation and Properties of Antioxidative Copper Inks with High Electrical Conductivity.
abstract: Conductive ink using copper nanoparticles has attracted much attention in the printed electronics industry because of its low cost and high electrical conductivity. However, the problem of easy oxidation under heat and humidity conditions for copper material limits the wide applications. In this study, antioxidative copper inks were prepared by dispersing the nanoparticles in the solution, and then conductive copper films can be obtained after calcining the copper ink at 250 °C in nitrogen atmosphere for 30 min. A low sheet resistance of 47.6 mΩ/□ for the copper film was measured by using the four-point probe method. Importantly, we experimentally demonstrate that the electrical conductivity of copper films can be improved by increasing the calcination temperature. In addition, these highly conductive copper films can be placed in an atmospheric environment for more than 6 months without the oxidation phenomenon, which was verified by energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS). These observations strongly show that our conductive copper ink features high antioxidant properties and long-term stability and has a great potential for many printed electronics applications, such as flexible display systems, sensors, photovoltaic cells, and radio frequency identification.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nuclear Energy Research, Atomic Energy Council, Executive Yuan, Taoyuan, 32546, Taiwan. CYTsai@iner.gov.tw.
authors.forename: Chia-Yang
authors.initials: CY
authors.lastname: Tsai
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nuclear Energy Research, Atomic Energy Council, Executive Yuan, Taoyuan, 32546, Taiwan. changpeter@iner.gov.tw.
authors.forename: Wei-Chen
authors.initials: WC
authors.lastname: Chang
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nuclear Energy Research, Atomic Energy Council, Executive Yuan, Taoyuan, 32546, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Guan-Lin
authors.initials: GL
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nuclear Energy Research, Atomic Energy Council, Executive Yuan, Taoyuan, 32546, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Cheng-Huan
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Chung
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nuclear Energy Research, Atomic Energy Council, Executive Yuan, Taoyuan, 32546, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Jun-Xiang
authors.initials: JX
authors.lastname: Liang
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nuclear Energy Research, Atomic Energy Council, Executive Yuan, Taoyuan, 32546, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Wei-Yang
authors.initials: WY
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nuclear Energy Research, Atomic Energy Council, Executive Yuan, Taoyuan, 32546, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Tsun-Neng
authors.initials: TN
authors.lastname: Yang
keywords: Antioxidant; Conductive ink; Resistivity; Stability