Large-Area All-Printed Temperature Sensing Surfaces Using Novel Composite Thermistor Materials

Large-Area All-Printed Temperature Sensing Surfaces Using Novel Composite Thermistor Materials

Katerinopoulou, Dimitra (TNO; University of Crete)
Zalar, Peter (TNO)
Sweelssen, Jorgen (TNO)
Kiriakidis, George (University of Crete)
Rentrop, Corné (TNO)
Groen, W.A. (TU Delft Novel Aerospace Materials; TNO)
Gelinck, Gerwin H. (TNO; Eindhoven University of Technology)
van den Brand, Jeroen (TNO; Universiteit Gent)
Smits, Edsger C.P. (TNO)

2018-01-01

Surfaces which can accurately distinguish spatial and temporal changes in temperature are critical for not only flow sensors, microbolometers, process control, but also future applications like electronic skins and soft robotics. Realizing such surfaces requires the deposition of thousands of thermal sensors over large areas, a task ideally suited for printing technologies. Negative temperature coefficient (NTC) ceramics represent the industry standard in temperature sensing due to their high thermal coefficient and excellent stability. A drawback is their complex and high temperature fabrication process and high stiffness, prohibiting their monolithic integration in large area or flexible applications. As a remedy, a printable NTC composite that combines a rapid and scalable all-printed fabrication process with performances that are on par with conventional NTC ceramics is demonstrated. The composite consists of micrometer-sized manganese spinel oxide particles dispersed in a benzocyclobutene matrix. The sensor has a B coefficient of 3500 K, with a 4.0% change in resistance at 25 °C, comparable to bulk ceramics. The selected polymer binder yields a composite exhibiting less than a 1 °C change in resistance to changes in humidity. The sensor's scalability is validated by demonstration of a Q4 A4-sized temperature sensing sheet consisting of over 400 sensors.

ceramics
organic–inorganic composites
printed electronics
temperature sensors

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:8e66973f-de3c-41f5-a43b-35dad65668cf

https://doi.org/10.1002/aelm.201800605

2019-07-01

Advanced Electronic Materials

Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository ‘You share, we take care!’ – Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.

Institutional Repository

journal article

© 2018 Dimitra Katerinopoulou, Peter Zalar, Jorgen Sweelssen, George Kiriakidis, Corné Rentrop, W.A. Groen, Gerwin H. Gelinck, Jeroen van den Brand, Edsger C.P. Smits