New method to fabricate 3D curvy electronics

We report a manufacturing technology, called conformal additive stamp (CAS) printing and show that it can be used to reliably manufacture electronic devices with 3D shapes. Our CAS printing approach employs a pneumatically inflated elastomeric balloon as a conformal stamping medium to pick up pre-fabricated electronic devices and print them onto 3D surfaces to create devices with curvy shapes including electrically small antennas, hemispherical solar cells and smart contact lenses. Mechanical modeling and simulation are critical important in designing and optimizing the CAS printing method to fully understand the interaction between the balloon and the electronic devices, the mechanical deformation of the balloon during inflation and transfer printing process, and the strain and deformation in the electronic devices during the CAS process. This techonoloy is developed by Prof. Cunjiang Yu' Group from the University of Houston in collaboration with Prof. Jianliang Xiao' Group from the University of Colorado Boulder. 

This work is recently published in Nature Electronics, and there is the link: K Sim, S Chen, Z Li et al., Three-dimensional curvy electronics created using conformal additive stamp printing. Nature Electronics, 2019; 

This work is also highlighted by the journal Nature.