Template – 2 Pages Extended Abstract

Mechanical Analysis and Constitutive modeling of Non-linear Behavior

of Ag-based Conductive Ink

Sana Zulfiqar1, Abdullah Aziz Saad1, Zulkifli Ahmad2, Zuraihana Bachok1

1
School of Mechanical Engineering, Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)
2
School of Materials & Mineral Resources Engineering, Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)
Tel: +60195186084 Email: [email protected]

ABSTRACT

Stretchable electronic devices mainly comprised of a substrate and conductive ink. The electrical conductivity of such
devices depends on the choice of conductive ink utilized in the circuit. This study focusses on the mechanical and material
characterization of silver-based conductive ink. The conductive ink is composed of a polymeric binder, cross-linking
agent, organic solvent, catalysts and silver powder. Universal tensile testing is used to analyse the stress-strain behaviour
of conductive ink. Moreover, the nanoindentation testing is done to observe the elastic modulus and hardness of the ink.
The experimental results are then employed on the different elastic-plastic constitutive models to describe the non-linear
behaviour of conductive ink.

Keywords: Silver conductive ink, Nanoindentation, Elastic-plastic modeling, Tensile test, Material characterization.

INTRODUCTION D412 type C standard is used to make the three samples

of the ink for further analysis. The structural reliability
In last few decades, the stretchable and flexible and mechanical properties of conductive ink are
electronic devices have become more popular in various obtained via UTM and nanoindentation testings.
mechanical and electrical applications such as Although, nanoindentation has become very popular
mechanical sensors (Cheng et al., 2015), actuators, technique of finding mechanical properties of different
microfluidic circuits(Akther et al., 2020), robotics materials (Rouf et al., 2020). The depth sensing
(Casanova-Moreno et al., 2017), electronic devices (S. indentation is widely used to extract the hardness and
Zulfiqar et al., 2020; S Zulfiqar et al., 2021), etc. These elastic properties of specimen with known geometry of
devices are composed of stretchable substrate and indenters and material properties.
conductive ink. Conductive ink is the most important
and primary part of any electronic system that can be The aim of this study is to investigate the mechanical
design or fabricate into a certain geometry to get the and material characterizations of fabricated Ag-based
desire stretchability. conductive ink using UTM machine and
nanoindentation. The elastic-plastic constitutive model is
Several research has been carried out on the also applied on the experimental data to examine the
development of different conductive inks in which non-linear behaviour of the ink under plane stress
different types of conductive fillers and elastomers are condition obtained from both the testing.
utilized (Sana Zulfiqar et al., 2021). These conductive
fillers include carbon-based conductors, metal-based RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
(Au, Ag, Cu, Al, etc.) and organic conductive polymers.
In this study, Ag is opted as a conductive filler in the The mechanical performance of conductive ink was
metallic filled polymer composite ink because it checked by tensile testing and nanoindentation
possesses high electrical conductivity (6.3 x 107 Ω-1 m-1) technique. The tensile test was carried out on the three
and remains conductive after atmospheric exposure than dog-bone shaped samples of the ink in UTM with a
other metallic fillers like copper and aluminum whose cross-head speed of 10mm/min and 10 kN load cell at
electrical conductivity decreases after reacting with room temperature. The samples were gripped at their
oxygen. gauge length of 25mm and the average experimental
values produced the engineering stress-strain curve of
The Ag-based conductive ink is obtained by mixing the ink as shown in Figure 1 (Aziz et al., 2020; Sana
PDMS-OH epoxy resin with Ag powder in the presence Zulfiqar et al., 2021).
of organic solvent toluene. The reaction is then followed
by cross-linking agent and catalysts (acetic acid and Oliver and Pharr’s method is used in nanoindentation
dibutyltin dilaurate) at room temperature. The curing of to determine the hardness and elastic modulus based on
ink is done at room temperature for 24 hours. ASTM unloading processes. Berkovich indenter is used in

1
 Template – 2 Pages Extended Abstract

nanoindentation testing with an angle of Ø = 70.3°.The F. C., & Samsudin, Z. (2020). Chapter 8 - Stress
basic assumption is that the contact periphery sinks in in analysis of stretchable conductive polymer for
a manner that can be described by models for electronics circuit application. In A. S. H.
indentation of a flat elastic half-space by rigid punches Makhlouf & M. Aliofkhazraei (Eds.), Handbook
of simple geometry. Assuming that pile-up is negligible. of Materials Failure Analysis (pp. 205–224).
The hardness and elastic modulus can be calculated as Butterworth-Heinemann.
https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-
101937-5.00008-7
(1) Casanova-Moreno, J., To, J., Yang, C. W. T., Turner, R.
F. B., Bizzotto, D., & Cheung, K. C. (2017).
Fabricating devices with improved adhesion
(2) between PDMS and gold-patterned glass. Sensors
and Actuators, B: Chemical, 246, 904–909.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.snb.2017.02.109
(3) Cheng, C., Yang, A., Cheng, H., & Lai, M. (2015).
Development of Piezoelectric Gas Micro Pumps
with the PDMS Check Valve Design (Vol. 9, Issue
Finally, the engineering stress-strain data from UTM is 7, pp. 1252–1257). Zenodo.
then converted to yield stress and plastic strain for https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1107718
constitutive modeling. The material parameters of the Rouf, S., Altaf, S., Malik, S., & Najar, K. A. (2020).
ink are obtained by implementing the multi-linear plastic Comparative Analysis Carried Out on Modern
models, such as isotropic and kinematic hardening Indentation Techniques for the Measurement of
models, on the stress and plastic strain data. Moreover, Mechanical Properties: A Review. Post-Transition
the same elastic-plastic model is applied on the Metals.
nanoindentation data to check the non-linear behaviour Zulfiqar, S., Saad, A. A., Chek, M. W., Sharif, M. F. M.,
of the ink. Samsudin, Z., & Ali, M. Y. T. (2020). Structural
and Random Vibration Analysis of LEDs
Conductive Polymer Interconnections. IOP
Conference Series: Materials Science and
Engineering, 815(1). https://doi.org/10.1088/1757-
899X/815/1/012003
Zulfiqar, S, Saad, A. A., Sharif, M. F. M., Samsudin, Z.,
Ali, M. Y. T., Ani, F. C., Ahmad, Z., & Abdullah,
M. K. (2021). Alternative manufacturing process
of 3-dimensional interconnect device using
thermoforming process. Microelectronics
Reliability, 127, 114373.
https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.microrel.2
Fig. 1 Stress-strain curve of conductive ink using UTM 021.114373
Zulfiqar, Sana, Saad, A. A., Ahmad, Z., Yusof, F., &
CONCLUSION Bachok, Z. (2021). Structural Analysis and
Material Characterization of Silver Conductive Ink
The mechanical properties of conductive ink are for Stretchable Electronics. International Journal
obtained through tensile testing and nanoindentation. of Integrated Engineering, 13(7), 128–135.
The stress-strain data from UTM is then utilized for https://publisher.uthm.edu.my/ojs/index.php/ijie/ar
material modeling in order to determine the material ticle/view/9536
parameters that show the non-linearity of the ink. The
multi-linear models are also applied on the elastic ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
modulus of the ink obtained through nanoindentation.
The results from both the testing reveal that the This research is carried out under the research project
formulated conductive ink exhibits good stretchability supported via Research University Grant
and strength under defined conditions. 1001.PMEKANIK.8014067 and Short Term Grant
304.PMEKANIK.6315494 supported by Universiti
REFERENCES
Sains Malaysia (USM). The authors also like to
Akther, F., Yakob, S. B., Nguyen, N. T., & Ta, H. T. acknowledge the Polymer and Rubber labs of school of
(2020). Surface Modification Techniques for materials and mineral engineering of USM for giving
Endothelial Cell Seeding in PDMS Microfluidic experimental services to pursue this study.
Devices. Biosensors, 10(11).
https://doi.org/10.3390/bios10110182
Aziz, N. A., Saad, A. A., Ahmad, Z., Zulfiqar, S., Ani,