NanoGram Corporation Announces First Ambient, Inkjet-able NanoParticle Silicon Ink to Reach Amorphous Silicon Performance

NanoGram Corporation, a leading developer and manufacturer of advanced materials and solutions for optical, electronic and energy applications, announced today the successful fabrication of the first thin film transistor (TFT) produced by ambient printed nanosilicon to reach a carrier mobility of 2.0 cm2/Vs. The TFT is based on a non-pyrophoric material and was produced by Sharp Laboratories of America.

NanoGram’s printable silicon material is based on nano-scale crystalline silicon particles formulated into inks, which can be ink-jetted or spin coated onto a substrate and then fabricated into a TFT. The proprietary ink technology was developed as part of NanoGram’s technology development agreement (TDA) with Teijin Limited.

“Since NanoGram’s material is both inorganic and non-pyrophoric, it does not suffer from the product stability issues that can affect organic semiconductors nor the potential handling issues associated with polysilane-based materials,” said Scott Ferguson, NanoGram vice president of advanced materials technology and operations.

“We feel this product can eliminate two important roadblocks in the printed electronics industry,” said Ferguson. “Aside from the product advantages, such as lifetime stability and the performance of a proven inorganic semiconductor, our silicon inks are formulated with common printing solvent systems designed with an emphasis on manufacturability and safe handling using existing printing technologies and equipment.”

NanoGram’s target applications for this technology are light, flexible, printed electronics applications including flat panel display backplanes for LCD and thin film photovoltaics.

The silicon ink is produced using NanoGram’s proprietary laser pyrolysis-based Nanoparticle Manufacturing (NPM) process, suitable for high volume production.