TY - JOUR
T1 - Organic nanocomposite structure tailored by controlling droplet coalescence during inkjet printing
AU - Ihnen, Andrew C.
AU - Petrock, Anne M.
AU - Chou, Tsengming
AU - Fuchs, Brian E.
AU - Lee, Woo Y.
PY - 2012/9/26
Y1 - 2012/9/26
N2 - Inkjet printing offers a low-cost, high-throughput avenue for producing functional organic materials through rapid translation of desktop discoveries to industrial roll-to-roll processes. Here, we report a simple, but effective strategy to control droplet coalescence during inkjet printing, as a major variable, to tailor the nanoscale morphology of organic composite materials produced upon evaporation of all-liquid inks. During deposition, the spacing between ink droplets was controlled to systematically vary the extent of droplet coalescence. Our results show that decreasing coalescence increased the solvent evaporation rate, supersaturation of the solutes, and nucleation density of the precipitating organic crystals. This phenomenon was utilized to tailor the average size of pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN) crystals dispersed in an adhesive binder matrix from ∼0.2 to upwards of 100 μm. The results suggest that controlling the extent of droplet coalescence can be used as an effective means to tailor the composite morphology of printed organic materials at the nanoscale.
AB - Inkjet printing offers a low-cost, high-throughput avenue for producing functional organic materials through rapid translation of desktop discoveries to industrial roll-to-roll processes. Here, we report a simple, but effective strategy to control droplet coalescence during inkjet printing, as a major variable, to tailor the nanoscale morphology of organic composite materials produced upon evaporation of all-liquid inks. During deposition, the spacing between ink droplets was controlled to systematically vary the extent of droplet coalescence. Our results show that decreasing coalescence increased the solvent evaporation rate, supersaturation of the solutes, and nucleation density of the precipitating organic crystals. This phenomenon was utilized to tailor the average size of pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN) crystals dispersed in an adhesive binder matrix from ∼0.2 to upwards of 100 μm. The results suggest that controlling the extent of droplet coalescence can be used as an effective means to tailor the composite morphology of printed organic materials at the nanoscale.
KW - crystal nucleation and growth
KW - droplet spacing
KW - ink droplet coalescence
KW - inkjet printing
KW - organic nanocomposite materials
KW - supersaturation
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U2 - 10.1021/am301050n
DO - 10.1021/am301050n
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84867481971
SN - 1944-8244
VL - 4
SP - 4691
EP - 4699
JO - ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces
JF - ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces
IS - 9
ER -