Progress Toward Development of All-Printed RFID Tags: Materials, Processes, and Devices

TLDR

Printed electronics offers a promising pathway toward ultralow‑cost RFID tags for item‑level tracking of consumer goods. The study reports progress in developing materials, processes, and devices for realizing ultralow‑cost printed RFID tags. Printed nanoparticle patterns sintered at plastic‑compatible temperatures produce low‑resistance interconnects and passive components, while printed transistors with mobilities >10⁻¹ cm²/V·s (using novel pentacene/oligothiophene for pMOS and ZnO nanoparticles for nMOS) achieve AC performance adequate for 135‑kHz RFID, though further work is needed for 13.56‑MHz operation.

Abstract

Printed electronics provides a promising potential pathway toward the realization of ultralow-cost RFID tags for item-level tracking of consumer goods. Here, we report on our progress in developing materials, processes, and devices for the realization of ultralow-cost printed RFID tags. Using printed nanoparticle patterns that are subsequently sintered at plastic-compatible temperatures, low-resistance interconnects and passive components have been realized. Simultaneously, printed transistors with mobilities >10/sup -1/ cm/sup 2//V-s have been realized using novel pentacene and oligothiophene precursors for pMOS and ZnO nanoparticles for nMOS. AC performance of these devices is adequate for 135-kHz RFID, though significant work remains to be done to achieve 13.56-MHz operation.