Researchers Turn to Roll-to-Roll Manufacturing for Mass Production of Stretchable Electronics
Originally developed to print newspapers and magazines, roll-to-roll manufacturing could prove key to commercializing stretchy electronics.
Researchers at Yokohama National University and the Tokyo Institute of Technology have come up with a new approach to manufacturing stretchable electronics — which, they hope, could deliver easy mass production, using a roll-to-roll (R2R) process.
"In this study, we conducted research and development for the mass production of stretchable devices based on the R2R production process," Hiroki Ota, associate professor at Yokohama National University and co-author of the paper, explains. "These technologies are important to promote market introduction in order to further develop the field of stretchable electronics, which is still in the research phase."
Stretchable electronics go one step beyond flexible electronics by not only deforming to follow a surface but allowing themselves to be stretch and compressed without damage — and even while running. There are plenty of stretchable electronics projects in the lab, but few have made it out into the wild owing to complexities in scaling up their production.
That's where the team's research comes in. Using a roll-to-roll manufacturing process originally developed for printing newspapers and magazines, now commonplace for the production of solar cells and flexible electronics, the team believes it's possible to mass-produce stretchable electronics.
The researchers proved the potential of their approach by building 15 stretchable devices designed to detect light and measure temperatures, all of which proved capable of operating even when stretched to 70 percent of the material's theoretical maximum limit.
The researchers, though, admit work still needs to be done. "The stretchable wiring technology has not been realized by the R2R process technology," Ota explains, "and in the future, by linking the R2R production process technology for liquid metal wiring and substrates, the R2R process can realize the continuous and mass production of the stretchable device itself."
The team's work has been published in the journal Advanced Materials Technologies under open-access terms.