Micro-Three-Dimensional Patterning by Inkjet Printing of UV Curable Inks

A UV curable ink serves as a model fluid to find a basic description of the formation of micro-three-dimensional patterns by inkjet printing. The ink was deposited on a rigid surface to form solid lines after irradiation with UV light. The dimensions of the resulting patterns were analyzed with regard to the following settings varied: (1) drop spacing; (2) number of active nozzles; (3) orientation of the lines parallel or perpendicular to printing direction; (4) number of layers printed on top of each other. In addition, two different time-modes of the irradiation with UV light were applied to investigate the influence of printing 'wet-in-wet' or 'wet-in-dry': either the irradiation was carried out in one step after the complete printing process or in multiple steps during the printing process. The reported results contribute to understand the formation of functional patterns by inkjet printing in general. Furthermore, based on previous works we show examples like microsieves in which UV curable inks can be applied to create functional patterns.