Flexible supercapacitor fabrication by room temperature rapid laser processing of roll-to-roll printed metal nanoparticle ink for wearable electronics application

We introduce a rapid and low-temperature laser annealing process of roll-to-roll (R2R) printed metal nanoparticle (NP) ink on a polymer substrate as an alternative to the conventional thermal annealing process using expensive and time consuming lengthy furnace. Due to the confined heating induced by the focused laser, R2R printed Ag NP film is selectively turned into a continuous conductive film without heating the whole substrate. As a result, the damage on the underlying polymer 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. The 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.