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The pace of 3D-printing ICs is quickening

Additive manufacturing is poised to transform the electronics industry

3d printing

A collaboration between the Air Force Research Laboratory and American Semiconductor led to production in 2017 of a flexible silicon-on-polymer chip with more than 7,000 times the memory capability of any flexible integrated circuit available at the time. The manufacturing process takes advantage of flexible hybrid electronics, integrating traditional manufacturing techniques with 3D electronic printing to create thin, flexible semiconductors. Air Force Research Laboratory

In the movie Back to the Future III, set in 1955, Dr. Emmett Brown uses a series of vacuum tubes to replicate the DeLorean’s damaged time-circuit control microchip and send Marty McFly back to the Old West. He used tubes because the means to create any form of advanced circuitry wasn’t developed until 1958, when Texas Instruments employee Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce of Fairchild Semiconductor independently and almost simultaneously invented the integrated circuit, or IC.

The electronics industry would never be the same.

There’s a similarly fundamental change underway right now. A Google search for “3D printed integrated circuits” illustrates my point:

  • Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, for example, have established “an innovative approach to construct arbitrary 3D systems with embedded electrical structures as integrated circuitry for various applications.”
  • Duke University scientists have demonstrated “the potential for FFF (fused filament fabrication) 3D printing to create complex, three-dimensional circuits composed of either embedded or fully printed electronic components.”
  • The Air Force Research Laboratory has collaborated with American Semiconductor Inc. to produce a flexible “system on a chip” for Internet of Things (IoT) applications.

What’s perhaps most interesting about these reports is that they’re old news. The most recent was published in late 2017, an eternity ago in the world of additive manufacturing. So what’s developed since then?

One good example comes from Optomec. The company recently introduced a new electronics printer for in-line production of high-resolution circuitry. It works by jetting an extremely fine mist of nanoparticle-based inks onto a surface and reportedly can print copper, gold, or silver features as narrow as 10 microns with placement accuracy under 5 microns.

There’s also Nano Dimension and its DragonFly system, designed for additively manufacturing printed-circuit boards and non-planar electronics. And don’t forget HP, whose website continues to promise “a future where we can produce ‘smart parts’ with embedded electronics.”

More such pioneering efforts are sure to come.

Relative to the science fiction classic I led with, we’re still early in the movie, right around the point where (spoiler alert!) the bear eats Marty’s cowboy boots. Compared to the ultrasmall, ultrapowerful chips found in today’s smartphones and laptop computers, 3D-printed circuitry is on par with the first crude “Solid Circuits” of Jack Kilby’s day.

Still, it’s fun to imagine where we’ll be 50 years from now. If only I had a DeLorean.

About the Author

Kip Hanson

Kip Hanson is a freelance writer with more than 35 years working in and writing about manufacturing. He lives in Tucson, Ariz.