Fabrication of Copper Patterns on Polydimethylsiloxane through Laser-Induced Selective Metallization

Selective metallization is widely used in the fabrication of conductive circuits and metallized patterns. In this work, a facile approach for the fabrication of copper patterns on polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) substrates was developed through a 1064 nm pulsed near-infrared (NIR) laser activation and selective metallization. The laser sensitizer of copper hydroxyl phosphate [Cu-2(OH)PO4] and antimony-doped tin oxide (ATO) were incorporated into PDMS resin to prepared laser direct structuring (LDS) materials, respectively. The physical morphology and chemical composition of PDMS/Cu-2(OH)PO4 and PDMS/ATO after 1064 nm pulsed NIR laser activation and metallization characterizations were determined. The laser-irradiated area of the PDMS substrate exhibited catalyst activation, which could trigger an electroless copper plating (ECP) reaction. The obtained copper patterns exhibit strong mechanical adhesion on the PDMS substrate, which reaches class SB level after an adhesive tape test (ASTM D3359 standard). Moreover, the conductivity of the obtained copper pattern on PDMS/Cu-2(OH)PO4 and PDMS/ATO is around 2.09 X 10(7) and 1.38 X 10(7) Omega(-1).m(-1). This study provides a strategy to fabricate PDMS-based LDS materials for large-scale industrial applications.