Page 32 - MSAM-1-2

Materials Science in Additive Manufacturing

ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLE
Multi-objective optimization of intense pulsed

light sintering process for aerosol jet printed thin
film

2†
1†
1
Guo Liang Goh , Haining Zhang , Guo Dong Goh , Wai Yee Yeong *,
1
Tzyy Haur Chong 3,4
1 Singapore Centre for 3D Printing, School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Nanyang
Technological University, Singapore
2 Department of Intelligent Manufacturing, School of Information Engineering, Suzhou University,
Suzhou, China
3 Singapore Membrane Technology Centre, Nanyang Environment & Water Research Institute,
Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
4 School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Abstract

The sintering of printed nanoparticle films is a necessary processing step for most
nanoparticle inks to make the printed film functional. The sintering of nanoparticle
is usually performed through thermal sintering, photonic sintering, induction
sintering, etc. Intense pulsed light (IPL) sintering method is one of the most popular
† These authors contributed equally
to this work sintering methods for nanoparticle inks due to the fast and effective process, but
*Corresponding author: it may yield mediocre performance if improper sintering parameters are used. In
Wai Yee Yeong this work, we investigate the correlation between the two factors which are the
(wyyeong@ntu.edu.sg) print passes of aerosol jet printing and the sintering distance of the samples on the
Citation: Goh GL, Zhang H, effect of the surface morphology and sheet resistance. A contradictory correlation
Goh GD, et al., 2022, Multi- between the two factors was observed and a multi-objective optimization was
objective optimization of intense carried out using machine learning method to identify the most optimum conditions
pulsed light sintering process for
aerosol jet printed thin film. Mater for both factors. We found that multi-objective optimization approach is effective in
Sci Add Manuf. 1(2): 10. reducing the conflicting responses, thus the sintered thin film can have low sheet
http://doi.org/10.18063/msam.v1i2.10 resistance and low surface roughness. This work provides an essential guide for
achieving conductive films with electrical conductivity and low surface roughness
Received: March 31, 2022
using IPL sintering process for fast fabrication of multi-layered electronics such as
Accepted: May 10, 2022 electrochemical electrodes.
Published Online: June 22, 2022
Copyright: © 2022 Author(s). Keywords: Additive manufacturing; 3D printing; Printed electronics; Multi-objective
This is an Open Access article optimization; Photonic sintering; Process optimization
distributed under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution
License, permitting distribution,
and reproduction in any medium,
provided the original work is 1. Introduction
properly cited.
In the past decade, printed electronics technology has received great attention
Publisher’s Note: Whioce
Publishing remains neutral with because of the increasing needs for alternative electronics fabrication technology to
regard to jurisdictional claims in produce unconventional electronics, especially in the field of flexible and stretchable
published maps and institutional electronics [1,2] . Conventionally, electronics are manufactured using silicon wafer
affiliations.

Volume 1 Issue 2 (2022) 1 http://doi.org/10.18063/msam.v1i2.10