Fabrication of thin and flexible supercapacitors using laser annealing process

Abstract

A rapid and low-temperature laser annealing process for roll-to-roll (R2R) printed metal nanoparticle (NP) ink on polymer substrate is introduced to substitute the conventional thermal annealing process using lengthy furnace. Due to the confined heating induced by the focused laser, R2R printed Ag NP film is selec-tively turned into continuous conductive film without heating the whole substrate. As a result, the damage on the underlying substrate, as well as the processing time required for the annealing, is significantly reduced by the laser annealing compared to the conventional thermal annealing. The resultant laser annealed Ag NP film also exhibits superior electrical and mechanical properties in comparison to the thermal annealed sample. Both thermal and laser annealed Ag NP film is further applied to the flexible supercapacitor as the current collector in order to confirm the excellence of laser annealed Ag NP film in the fabrication of practical devices.