Bubble Printing of Liquid Metal Colloidal Particles for Conductive Patterns

Bubble printing is a patterning method in which particles are accumulated by the convection of bubbles generated by laser focusing. It is attracting attention as a method that enables the high-speed, high-precision patterning of various micro/nanoparticles. Although the bubble printing method is used for metallic particles and organic particles, most reports have focused on the patterning of solid particles and not on the patterning of liquid particles. In this study, liquid metal wiring patterns were fabricated using a bubble printing method in which eutectic gallium‒indium alloy (EGaIn) colloidal particles (≈diameter 0.7 µm) were fixed on a glass substrate by generating microbubbles through heat generation by focusing a femtosecond laser beam on the EGaIn colloidal particles. The wiring was then made conductive by replacing gallium oxide, which served as a resistance layer on the surface of the EGaIn colloidal particles, with silver via galvanic replacement. Fine continuous lines of liquid metal colloids with a line width of 3.4 µm were drawn by reducing the laser power. Liquid metal wiring with a conductivity of ≈1.5 × 105 S/m was formed on a glass substrate. It was confirmed that the conductivity remained consistent even when the glass substrate was bent to a curvature of 0.02 m−1.