Search

Graphene oxide (GO) and nitrogen-doped graphene (NG) coated copper nanoparticles (NPs) have been developed in this work and investigated as nanofiller for water as Heat Transfer Fluids (HTFs). The morphology and composition of the coating were characterized to confirm the presence of functional groups and the nitrogendoping of the graphene coating. Different fractions of the two types of coated nanoparticles NPs between 0.1 and 10 wt.% were dispersed in water. The thermal conductivity of the dispersions was evaluated at temperatures between 20 and 50 °C. A positive correlation between the thermal conductivity of the HTFs and the fraction and temperature are observed as a result of the increase of the solid phase contribution into the heat transfer. At a concentration of 0.5 wt.%, the thermal conductivity of the NG-CuNPs nanofluid reached its maximum increase of 78%, compared to a 13% increase in the case of GO-CuNPs. However, due to the poor stability of the NG-CuNPs, further increase of the solid phase did not result in any additional improvement. In contrast, the thermal conductivity of the GO-based dispersion resulted in a 103% enhancement at 10 wt.% at a temperature of 50 °C.

Abstract: During the last decades, there has been growing interest in using therapeutic messager RNA (mRNA) together with drug delivery systems. Naked, unformulated mRNA is, however, unable to cross the cell membrane and is susceptible to degradation. Here we use graphene quantum dots (GQDs) functionalized with polyethyleneimine (PEI) as a novel mRNA delivery system. Our results show that these modified GQDs can be used to deliver intact and functional mRNA to Huh‐7 hepatocarcinoma cells at low doses and, that the GQDs are not toxic, although cellular toxicity is a problem for these first‐generation modified particles. Functionalized GQDs represent a potentially interesting delivery system that is easy to manufacture, stable and effective., Message delivered! A novel graphene quantum dots based mRNA drug delivery platform was prepared. The results show that these modified GQDs can deliver intact and functional mRNA to Huh‐7 hepatocarcinoma cells at low doses. The transfection efficiency for FGQDs/mRNA complexes was 25 % with a formulation concentration of 4000 ng mRNA/mL, but comparable transfection efficiencies could be achieved at much lower doses if the ratio between carrier and cargo was optimized. This work describes the first steps towards a potentially interesting preparation method for stable and effective mRNA delivery systems.

Carbon nanotube (CNT) array thermal interface materials (TIMs) are promising candidates for high-performance applications in terms of thermal performance. However, in order to be useful in commercial applications, the reliability of the interfaces is an equally important parameter, which so far has not been thoroughly investigated. In this study, the reliability of CNT array TIMs is investigated through accelerated aging. The roles of CNT array height and substrate configuration are studied for their relative impact on thermal resistance degradation. After aging, the CNT catalyst is analyzed using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy to evaluate chemical changes. The CNT-catalyst bond appears to degrade during aging but not to the extent that the TIM performance is compromised. On the other hand, coefficient of thermal expansion mismatch between surfaces creates strain that needs to be absorbed, which requires CNT arrays with sufficient height. Transfer and bonding of both CNT roots and tips also create more reliable interfaces. Crucially, we find that the CNT array height of most previously reported CNT array TIMs is not enough to prevent significant reliability problems.

This review focuses on the recent advances in the synthesis of graphene quantum dots (GQDs) and their applications in drug delivery. To give a brief understanding about the preparation of GQDs, recent advances in methods of GQDs synthesis are first presented. Afterwards, various drug delivery-release modes of GQDs-based drug delivery systems such as EPR-pH delivery-release mode, ligand-pH delivery-release mode, EPR-Photothermal delivery-Release mode, and Core/Shell-photothermal/magnetic thermal delivery-release mode are reviewed. Finally, the current challenges and the prospective application of GQDs in drug delivery are discussed.

Purpose This study aims to develop a bimodal nano-silver paste with improved mechanical property and reliability. Silicon carbide (SiC) particles coated with Ag were introduced in nano-silver paste to improve bonding strength between SiC and Ag particles and enhance high-temperature stability of bimodal nano-silver paste. The effect of sintering parameters such as sintering temperature, sintering time and the proportion of SiC particles on mechanical property and reliability of sintered bimodal nano-silver structure were investigated. Design/methodology/approach Sandwich structures consist of dummy chips and copper substrates with nickel and silver coating bonded by nano-silver paste were designed for shear testing. Shear strength testing was conducted to study the influence of SiC particles proportions on the mechanical property of sintered nano-silver joints. The reliability of the bimodal nano-silver paste was evaluated experimentally by means of shear test for samples subjected to thermal aging test at 150°C and humidity and temperature testing at 85°C and 85 per cent RH, respectively. Findings Shear strength was enhanced obviously with the increase of sintering temperature and sintering time. The maximum shear strength was achieved for nano-silver paste sintered at 260°C for 10 min. There was a negative correlation between the proportion of SiC particles and shear strength. After thermal aging testing and humidity and temperature testing for 240 h, the shear strength decreased a little. High-temperature stability and high-hydrothermal stability were improved by the addition of SiC particles. Originality/value Submicron-scale SiC particles coated with Ag were used as alternative materials to replace part of nano-silver particles to prepare bimodal nano-silver paste due to its high thermal conductivity and excellent mechanical property.

Thermally conductive materials with electrically insulating properties have been extensively investigated for thermal management of electronic devices. The combined properties of high thermal conductivity, structural stability, corrosion resistance and electric resistivity make hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) a promising candidate for this purpose. Theoretical studies have revealed that h-BN has a high in-plane thermal conductivity up to 400 - 800 W m−1 K−1 at room temperature. However, it is still a big challenge to achieve high thermally conductive h-BN thick films that are commercially feasible due to its poor mechanical properties. On the other hand, many polymers exhibit advantages for flexibility. Thus, combining the merits of polymer and the high thermal conductivity of h-BN particles is considered as a promising solution for this issue. In this work, orientated PVP/h-BN films were prepared by electrospinning and a subsequent mechanical pressing process. With the optimized h-BN loading, a PVP/h-BN composite film with up to 22 W m−1 K−1 and 0.485 W m−1 K−1 for in-plane and through-plane thermal conductivity can be achieved, respectively. We believe this work can help accelerate the development of h-BN for thermal management applications.

Increased demand on the mechanical and thermal properties on the thermal interface and die attach material creates a demand for materials with tailored material properties. Solder matrix fiber composites (SMFCs) have been shown to address these challenges, but have, so far, required complicated procedures and components. In this paper, we present the fabrication of a new type of SMFC based on commercially available fiber networks infiltrated with Sn–Ag–Cu alloy (SAC305) or indium using equipment for large-volume production. The composite material exhibits similar thermal properties compared to pure solder, and mechanical properties that can be tailored toward specific applications. We also show that the handling properties of the SMFC allows it to be used in process flows where multiple reflow cycles are required and can achieve a well-defined bond line thickness (BLT) and good bonding using fluxless reflow under pressure.

SiC microparticles with various weight ratios (0.0, 0.5, 1.0 and 1.5 wt%) are incorporated into sintered silver nanoparticles (AgNP) as one of the promising packaging materials for high-power electronic devices. Mechanical properties and constitutive behaviour of sintered AgNP reinforced by SiC microparticles are investigated based on nanoindentation experiment and analytical approach. Nanoindentations were performed in the manner of continuous stiffness measurement for a maximum penetration depth of 2000 nm at a strain rate of 0.05 s−1. Particularly, a Berkovich indenter is utilized to evaluate the values of Young's modulus and hardness, and a spherical indenter is utilized to describe the constitutive behaviour. For sintered AgNP with 0.5 wt% SiC, the morphology exhibits uniformly compact microstructures to enable optimizing the heat conductivity, the yield strength and hardening capacity of sintered AgNP material is enhanced. To describe the constitutive behaviour, an analytical approach is proposed to simulate the indentation behaviour. The parameters in the modified power-law model are determined by fitting the average indentation responses. The developed correlation between microstructure and macroscopic properties facilitates the design of AgNP paste morphology and improves the mechanical properties of sintered AgNP in electronics packaging.

During the last decade, graphene foam emerged as a promising high porosity 3-dimensional (3D) structure for various applications. More specifically, it has attracted significant interest as a solution for thermal management in electronics. In this study, we investigate the possibility to use such porous materials as a heat sink and a container for a phase change material (PCM). Graphene foam (GF) was produced using chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process and attached to a thermal test chip using sintered silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs). The thermal conductivity of the graphene foam reached 1.3 W m−1 K−1, while the addition of Ag as a graphene foam silver composite (GF/Ag) enhanced further its effective thermal conductivity by 54%. Comparatively to nickel foam, GF and GF/Ag showed lower junction temperatures thanks to higher effective thermal conductivity and a better contact. A finite element model was developed to simulate the fluid flow through the foam structure model and showed a positive and a non-negligible contributions of the secondary microchannel within the graphene foam. A ratio of 15 times was found between the convective heat flux within the primary and secondary microchannel. Our paper successfully demonstrates the possibility of using such 3D porous material as a PCM container and heat sink and highlight the advantage of using the carbon-based high porosity material to take advantage of its additional secondary porosity.

Thermal treatment of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) can significantly improve their mechanical, electrical and thermal properties due to reduced defects and increased crystallinity. In this work we investigate the effect of annealing at 3000 °C of vertically aligned CNT arrays synthesized by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) on graphite. Raman measurements show a drastically reduced amount of defects and, together with transmission electron microscope (TEM) diffraction measurements, an increased average crystallite size of around 50%, which corresponds to a 124% increase in Young’s modulus. We also find a tendency for CNTs to bond to each other with van der Waals (vdW) forces, which causes individual CNTs to closely align with each other. This bonding causes a densification effect on the entire CNT array, which appears at temperatures >1000 °C. The densification onset temperature corresponds to the thermal decomposition of oxygen containing functional groups, which otherwise prevents close enough contact for vdW bonding. Finally, the remaining CVD catalyst on the bottom of the CNT array is evaporated during annealing, enabling direct anchoring of the CNTs to the underlying graphite substrate.

Poor bonding strength between nanomaterials and cement composites inevitably lead to the failure of reinforcement. Herein, a novel functionalization method for the fabrication of functionalized graphene oxide (FGO), which is capable of forming highly reliable covalent bonds with cement hydration products, and therefore, suitable for use as an efficient reinforcing agent for cement composites, is discussed. The bonding strength between cement and aggregates was improved more than 21 times with the reinforcement of FGO. The fabricated FGO also demonstrated many important features, including high reliability in cement pastes, good dispersibility, and efficient structural refinement of cement hydration products. With the incorporation of FGO, cement mortar samples demonstrated up to 40 % increased early and ultimate strength. Such results make the fast demolding and manufacture of light constructions become highly possible, and show strong advantages on improving productivity, saving cost, and reducing CO2 emissions in practical applications.

High sinter density is desired in powder metallurgy components as the requirement for performance is increasing day‐by‐day. One of the promising ways to achieve improved densification during sintering is through the addition of nanopowder to the conventional micrometer sized metal powder. It is well known that the surface chemistry of the powder has a decisive effect on sintering and consequently the properties of the components produced. Extensive research has hence been conducted to elucidate the surface chemistry and its influence on sintering for powder used in conventional powder metallurgy. Nanopowder, owing to high surface to volume ratio, can contribute to the activation of sintering at lower temperatures and enhance the sinter density. In this context, the surface chemistry of the nanopowder is also expected to exhibit substantial influence on sintering. The present investigation is aimed at establishing a methodology to study the surface chemistry and oxide thickness of nanopowder. For this purpose, iron nanopowder of 3 different size fractions: 35 to 45, 40 to 60, and 60 to 80 nm with core‐shell structure were studied. Different approaches were adopted to evaluate the shell thickness of the iron nanoparticles. The methodology was developed and tried on low alloy steel nanopowder to measure oxide thickness. X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy, thermogravimetry, and high‐resolution scanning electron microscopy techniques were used to study the nanopowder. Results from different core‐shell models for iron nanopowder were found to be consistent except in the case where depth profiling was taken into account. The results were in agreement with the values obtained from thermogavimetry‐surface area correlation.

The Cover Feature shows a novel graphene quantum dots based mRNA drug delivery platform. The results show that these modified GQDs can deliver intact and functional mRNA to Huh‐7 hepatocarcinoma cells at low doses. This work describes the first steps towards a potentially interesting preparation method for stable and effective mRNA delivery systems. More information can be found in the Full Paper by Ya Liu et al.[Image: see text]

The trend of continuing miniaturisation of microelectronics leads to new thermal management challenges. A key point in the heat removal process development is to improve the heat conduction across interfaces through improved thermal interface materials (TIMs). We identify the key areas for state-of-the art TIM research and investigate the current state of the field together with possible future advances.

In this letter, the results from a series of experiments where graphene was grown on copper-platinum (Cu-Pt) alloy foils by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) are presented. By using Raman spectroscopy to analyze graphene films grown on Pt-Cu alloy foils with different Cu/Pt weight ratios (75/25, 50/50 and 25/75), we could show how the Cu/Pt weight ratio affected both the quality and the number of layers in the as-synthesized graphene films. Furthermore, graphene growth was shown to occur at temperatures as low as 750 °C due to what we believe is the strong catalytic ability of the Cu-Pt alloy foils. By keeping the flow rate of the CH4 precursor gas as low as 1.5 sccm, a low growth rate was obtained where the growth rates of monolayer and bilayer graphene could be controlled by simply adjusting the growth time.

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) were chemically modified to achieve strong binding strength with the attached functional components as well as good dispersability and nanoparticle size-uniformity. An efficient multi-oxidation process was developed to create porous out layer with many nanoscale defects on the surface of CNTs for metallic nanoparticle close attachment and bond sufficient oxygen-containing groups, which assisted the dispersion of CNTs in the aqueous solution. The surface modified CNTs have advantages of strong binding capability, large surface area, high mechanical strength and good dispersability, which show great potential as building blocks for hybrid nanomaterials. Monodispersed silver nano particles with an average size of 3 nm were formed from inside the created nanoscale defects on the surface of CNTs without any obvious agglomerations. The fabricated hybrid exhibited much enhanced anti-bacterial performance compared to commercial silver nanoparticles due to the combined antibacterial effects of CNTs and silver nanoparticles. With these superior properties, the developed surface modification process could be widely used for improving the performances of many CNT based hybrid nanomaterials in diverse applications.

Bilayer graphene is attractive for digital device applications due to the appearance of a bandgap under application of an electrical displacement field. Controllable and fast synthesis of bilayer graphene on copper by chemical vapor deposition is considered a crucial process from the perspective of industrial applications. Here, a systematic investigation of the influence of process parameters on the growth of bilayer graphene by chemical vapor deposition in a low pressure cold wall reactor is presented. In this study, the initial process stages have been of particular interest. We have found that the influence of the hydrogen partial pressure on synthesis is completely the opposite from that found for traditional tubular quartz CVD in terms of its influence on the graphene growth rate. H2/CH4 ratio was also found to effectively influence the properties of the synthesized bilayer graphene in terms of its atomic structure, whether it be AB-stacked or misoriented. Different pre-treatments of the copper foil, in combination with different annealing processes, were used to investigate the nucleation process with the aim of improving the controllability of the synthesis process. Based on an analysis of the nucleation activity, adsorption-diffusion and gas-phase penetration were employed to illustrate the synthesis mechanism of bilayer graphene on copper foil. After optimization of the synthesis process, large areas, up to 90% of a copper foil, were covered by bilayer graphene within 15 minutes. The total process time is only 45 minutes, including temperature ramp-up and cool-down by using a low pressure cold wall CVD reactor.

The integration of metallic nanoparticlcs (NPs) in nanofluids was found to enhance the thermal properties of the mixture and affect the rheological properties of the base liquid. However, due to their size and electrochemical properties, the added metallic nanoparticlcs have a limited contribution to the thermal transport and their stability hinders further development of such an approach in thermal management. We investigated in this work the effect of the presence of graphene as a coating layer of on copper nanoparticles dispersed in water as a water-based graphene coated copper nanofluid. Electronics microscopy was deployed to investigate the presence and the number of layers of graphene around the metallic nanoparticles. The observed particles were found to have a spherical morphology with a full coating of several layers. The elemental characterization of the NPs showed the presence of graphitic structure confirming the nature of the coating. The thermal properties of the fluid were estimated versus loading fraction of graphene coated nanoparticles and temperature using a hot disk method. An increase of up to 17% was recorded at a concentration of 0.1 w.% at 45deg C. Dynamic Light Scattering and zeta potential were used to investigate the electrochemical properties of the produced nanoparticles. The particles were found to present weak surface charges corresponding to a zeta potential of 6mV that promoted the segregation of the NPs. The rheological properties of the resulted fluids were investigated using viscometer. The NFs were found to have a Newtonian behaviour.

With the developing trend of miniaturization and integration of modern electronic devices, commercial heatsinks materials, like copper and aluminum, are facing more and more challenges, such as inefficient cooling performance, large size and heavy weight Here, we solve the problem by developing a novel highly thermal conductive and light-weight graphene heatsink. Composed by vertically-aligned and continuous graphene structures, heat transport was highly efficient from the base to fin structures inside the heatsink The maximum through-plane thermal conductivity of graphene heatsink can be up to 1000 1500 W/mK, which is over 7 times higher than aluminum, and even outperforms copper about 4 times. Graphene heatsink demonstrated outstanding cooling performance which was superior to copper heatsink with the same dimension and same power input. Noticeably, the graphene heatsink also has important advantages of light-weight and high emissivity. The measured density (1.1 g/cm) is only one-eighth of copper and less than half of aluminum and emissivity is about ten times higher than pure copper and aluminum. The resulting graphene heatsink thus opens new opportunities for addressing large heat dissipation issues in weight driven electronics and other high power systems.

Hexagonal Boron Nitride (h-BN) has been considered as a promising enhancement filler for thermal management due to its high thermal conductivity, structural stability, and super electrical resistivity. Numerus studies have reported using BN as an enhancement filler to achieve high thermally conductive polymer based thermal management materials. However, there are limited data regarding the influence of the flake size of BN sheets to the thermal management property of BN filled composites. In this work, three h-BN size geometries, including microscale h-BN powder, h-BN nanosheets, and a mixture of micro and nanoscale h-BN, were studied regarding its thermal transfer performance. The results show that h-BN nanosheets are able to achieve the highest in-plane thermal conductivity with loading from 0 – 5 wt% while for the through-plane thermal conductivity, all three geometries show similar thermal property when the filler loading less than 5 wt%. Through-plane thermal conductivity exhibits a sudden increase to 5.69 W m−1 K−1 at a loading of 5 wt%..

A novel nano-silver paste with characteristics of sintering at low temperature and operating at high temperature is one of the most promising interconnect materials in the semiconductor industry. This study focuses on the shear strength of sintered multi-scale silver paste synthesized by nano-silver particles, micro-silver particles and submicron silicon carbide particles coated with Ag (SCA). The silver paste was sintered at 250 °C without pressure. The shear strength reaches 9.22 MPa, with 64 wt.% nano-silver particles, 16.5 wt.% micro-silver particles and 1.5 wt.% SCA, respectively. With this, it shows great potential for high power electronics interconnect and cooing applications.

Graphene films (GFs) can be used in the field of electronics cooling, owing to many outstanding properties. In the present paper, GFs samples were graphitized at different pressures to study their effect on the mechanical properties. The elastic modulus and hardness of GFs were measured by nanoindentation and the tensile strength of GFs were obtained by stretching GFs in a tensile tester. Meanwhile, GFs were characterized by X-ray diffraction(XRD), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Raman spectroscopy. The results show that the modulus, hardness and tensile strength of GFs were strongly influenced by the defect and wrinkles among other things.

As feature density increases within microelectronics, so does the dissipated power density, which puts an increased demand on thermal management. Thermal interface materials (TIMs) are used at the interface between contacting surfaces to reduce the thermal resistance, and is a critical component within many electronics systems. Arrays of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have gained significant interest for application as TIMs, due to the high thermal conductivity, no internal thermal contact resistances and an excellent conformability. While studies show excellent thermal performance, there has to date been no investigation into the reliability of CNT array TIMs. In this study, CNT array TIMs bonded with polymer to close a Si-Cu interface were subjected to thermal cycling. Thermal interface resistance measurements showed a large degradation of the thermal performance of the interface within the first 100 cycles. More detailed thermal investigation of the interface components showed that the connection between CNTs and catalyst substrate degrades during thermal cycling even in the absence of thermal expansion mismatch, and the nature of this degradation was further analyzed using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. This study indicates that the reliability will be an important consideration for further development and commercialization of CNT array TIMs.

High density packaging in combination with increased transistor integration inevitably leads to challenging power densities in terms of thermal management. The conventional TIMs that are widely used in the microelectronic industry today are experiencing more and more stress due to their limited thermal performance and poor reliability. Composed by particle laden polymer matrix, thermal conductivity (K) of conventional TIMs is generally limited to 5 W/mK, and such values can be even lower for electrically insulated TIMs. Conventional TIMs also suffer from severe pump-out and dry-out failures, which brought great threat to the performance and lifetime of the electronic devices. Here, we solve these problems by applying a novel highly thermal conductive, electrically insulated and reliable graphene based TIMs (I-GTs). Composed by vertical graphene structures, I-GTs provide a continuous heat pathway from top to bottom, which enables superfast heat dissipation at through-plane direction. The highest bulk through-plane thermal conductivity of the conductive body can reach up to 1000 W/mK, which is orders of magnitude higher than conventional TIMs, and even outperforms the pure indium TIMs by over ten times. The highly flexible and foldable nature of I-GT enables at least 100% compressibility upon small applied pressures. As excellent gap fillers, I-GT can provide complete physical contact between two surfaces and thereby minimize the contact resistance to heat flow. The measured minimum thermal resistance for I-GTs reaches about 30 Kmm2/W. Such values are significantly higher than the randomly dispersed composites presented above. To ensure fully electrical insulation, a smooth and soft adhesive layer with a thickness of few microns was coated on the surface of I-GT. The breakdown voltage of I-GT reaches up to 950 V. Thermal cycling test shows the highly stable nature of I-GT. The good compressibility and elasticity of I-GT ensures continued proper TIM contact with substrates, which counteracts the effect of internal stress induced by the mismatch of coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) during temperature cycling. In addition, the I-GTs have the advantages of low density and good maintainability. The resulting I-GTs thus opens new opportunities for addressing large heat dissipation issues for form-factor driven electronics and other high power driven systems

With the establishment of the internet of things (IoT) and the rapid development of advanced microsystems, there is a growing demand to develop electrochemical capacitors (ECs) to replace bulky electrolytic capacitors on circuit boards for AC line filtering, and as a storage unit in energy autonomous systems. For this purpose, ECs must be capable of handling sufficiently high signal frequencies, display minimum energy loss through self-discharge and leakage current as well as maintaining an adequate capacitance. Here, we demonstrate ECs based on mechanically flexible, covalently bonded graphite/vertically aligned carbon nanotubes (graphite/VACNTs) hybrid materials. The ECs employing a KOH electrolyte exhibit a phase angle of −84.8°, an areal capacitance of 1.38 mF cm−2 and a volumetric capacitance (device level) of 345 mF cm−3 at 120 Hz, which is among the highest values for carbon based high frequency ECs. Additionally, the performance as a storage EC for miniaturized systems is evaluated. We demonstrate capacitive charging/discharging at μA current with a gel electrolyte, and sub-μA leakage current reached within 50 s, and 100 nA level equilibrium leakage within 100 s at 2.0 V floating with an ionic liquid electrolyte.

This paper concerns the thermal properties of graphene-based films for heat spreading applications. Following liquid phase exfoliation (LPE) films were made by two different methods, vacuum filtration and drop coating. Temperature decreases of up to 6 °C and 4 °C were measured at a heat flux density of 1200 W/cm2 for the vacuum filtrated and drop coated films respectively. For the first time in this paper, three different methods were combined to evaluate and predict the thermal performance of such graphene-based films. Resistance thermometers were used to monitor the hotspot temperature decrease versus the Joule heat flow as a result of using graphene-based heat spreaders. The 3ω method was used to experimentally determine the in-plane and through-plane thermal conductivities of such films. A finite element model of the hotspot test structure was setup using the in-plane and through-plane thermal conductivities (110 and 0.25 W/mK, respectively) obtained from the 3ω measurements. Simulations were performed to predict the hotspot temperature decrease with excellent agreement obtained between all methods. The results indicate that the alignment and purity of the graphene-based films, as well as their thermal boundary resistance with respect to the chip, are key parameters when determining the thermal performance of graphene-based heat spreaders.

Indium-based thermal interface materials are superior in thermal management applications of electronic packaging compared to their polymer-based counterparts. However, pure indium has rather low tensile strength resulting in poor reliability. To enhance the mechanical properties of such a material, a new composite consisting of electrospun randomly oriented continuous polyimide fibres and indium was fabricated. The composite has been characterised by tensile tests and in-situ transmission electron microscopy straining observations. It is shown that the composite's ultimate tensile strength at 20 degrees C is five times higher than that of pure indium, and the strength of the composite exceeds the summation of strengths of the individual components. Furthermore, contrary to most metallic matrix materials, the ultimate tensile strength of the composite decreases with the increased strain rate in a certain range. The chemical composition and tensile fracture of the novel composite have been analysed comprehensively by means of scanning transmission electron microscopy and scanning electron microscopy. A strengthening mechanism based on mutually reinforcing structures formed by the indium and surrounding fibres is also presented, underlining the effect of compressing at the fibre/indium interfaces by dislocation pileups and slip pinning.

In similarity to graphene, two-dimensional (2D) hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) has some remarkable properties, such as mechanical robustness and high thermal conductivity. In addition, hBN has superb chemical stability and it is electrically insulating. 2D hBN has been considered a promising material for many applications in electronics, including 2D hBN based substrates, gate dielectrics for graphene transistors and interconnects, and electronic packaging insulators. This paper reviews the synthesis, transfer and fabrication of 2D hBN films, hBN based composites and hBN-based van der Waals heterostructures. In particular, this review focuses on applications in manufacturing electronic devices where the insulating and thermal properties of hBN can potentially be exploited. 2D hBN and related composite systems are emerging as new and industrially important materials, which could address many challenges in future complex electronics devices and systems.

This paper presents a novel nanocomposite thermal interface material (Nano-TIM) consisting of a silver coated polyimide network and the indium matrix. One of the potential applications of this Nano-TIM is for heat dissipation in integrated circuits and electronic packaging. The shear strength of the Nano-TIM was investigated with DAGE-4000PSY shear tester. The shear strength of Nano-TIM is 4.5 MPa, which is 15% higher than that of the pure indium thermal interface material. The microstructure of cross-section and fracture surface was studied using Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). SEM pictures show a uniform polymer fiber distribution and solid interface between silver coated fibers and indium matrix. The thermal fatigue resistance of the Nano-TIM was evaluated by monitoring the variation of thermal interface resistance during the thermal cycling test (-40 to 125 degrees C). The thermal interface resistance was measured with a commercial xenon flash instrument after 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, and 1000 temperature cydes. The results-of thermal cycling test show that Nano-TIM presented consistent reliability performance with pure indium. Furthermore, the tooling effect of Nano-TIM was demonstrated through measuring the power chip temperature in the die attached structure by using an Infrared Camera. In the test, the Nano-TIM shows a comparable cooling effect to pure indium TIM for die attach applications in electronics packaging.

Mono- to few-layer graphene materials are successfully synthesized multiple times using Cu-Ni alloy as a catalyst after a single-chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process. The multiple synthesis is realized by extracting carbon source pre-dissolved in the catalyst substrate. Firstly, graphene is grown by the CVD method on Cu-Ni catalyst substrates. Secondly, the same Cu-Nicatalyst foils are annealed, in absence of any external carbon precursor, to grow graphene using the carbon atoms pre-dissolved in the catalyst during the CVD process. This annealing process is repeated to synthesize graphene successfully until carbon is exhausted in the Cu-Ni foils. After the CVD growth and each annealing growth process, the as-grown graphene is removed using a bubbling transfer method. A wide range of characterizations are performed to examine the quality of the obtained graphene material and to monitor the carbon concentration in the catalyst substrates. Results show that graphene from each annealing growth process possesses a similar quality, which confirmed the good reproducibility of the method. This technique brings great freedom to graphene growth and applications, and it could be also used for other 2D material synthesis.

The electrochemical capacitor (EC) is a key enabler for the miniaturized self-powered systems expected to become ubiquitous with the advent of the internet-of-things (IoT). Vertically aligned carbon nanotubes (VACNTs) on graphite holds promise as electrodes for compact and low-loss ECs. However, as with all ECs, the operating voltage is low, and miniaturization of higher voltage devices necessitates a bipolar design. In this paper, we demonstrate a bipolar EC using graphite/VACNTs electrodes fabricated using a joule heating chemical vapor deposition (CVD) setup. The constructed EC contains one layer of double-sided VACNTs on graphite as bipolar electrode. Compared to a series connection of two individual devices, the bipolar EC has 22% boost in volumetric energy density. More significant boost is envisaged for stacking more bipolar electrode layers. The energy enhancement is achieved without aggravating self-discharge (71.2% retention after 1 h), and at no sacrifice of cycling stability (96.7% over 50000 cycles) owing to uniform growth of VACNTs and thus eliminating cell imbalance problems.

High density packaging in combination with increased transistor integration inevitably leads to challenging power densities in terms of thermal management. Here, a novel highly thermal conductive and lightweight graphene based thermal interface materials (GT) was developed for thermal management in power devices. Composed by vertically graphene structures, GTs provide a continuous high thermal conductivity phase along the path of thermal transport, which lead to outstanding thermal properties. The highest through-plane thermal conductivity GTs reaches to 1000 W/mK, which is orders of magnitude higher than conventional TIMs, and even outperforms the pure indium by over ten times. In addition, a thin layer of indium metal that coated on the surface of GTs can easily form alloys with many other metals at a relatively low reflow temperature. Therefore, GTs, as an excellent TIM, can provide complete physical contact between two surfaces with minimized the contact resistance. The measured total thermal resistance and effective thermal conductivity by using 300 $\sim 3.7 Kmm$ 2 $ \textit {/W and $\sim 90\mathrm {W} /$ mK, respectively. Such values are significantly higher than the randomly dispersed composites presented above, and show even better thermal performance than pure indium bonding. In addition, GTs has more advantages than pure indium bonding, including low weight (density $ \lt 2\mathrm {g} /cm$}^{3}),$

High density packaging in combination with increased transistor integration inevitably leads to challenging power densities in terms of thermal management. Thermal interface materials (TIMs) play a key role in thermal management by transferring heat from the surface of power devices. The conventional TIMs used in the microelectronics industry today basically are particle laden polymer matrix composites, which have the advantages of good reliability and ease of use. However, the thermal conductivity (K) of these composites is generally limited to 10 W/mK, which is hard to meet the goal for efficient thermal management in power devices. Here, we solve the problem by applying a novel highly thermal conductive and compressible graphene based TIMs (GTs). Composed by vertical graphene structures, GTs provide a continuous high thermal conductivity phase along the path of thermal transport, which lead to outstanding thermal properties. By tailoring ratios of graphene in the polymer binder, bulk thermal conductivity of GTs can be varied from 50 to 1000 W/mK. This result isorders of magnitude higher than conventional TIMs, and even outperforms the pure indium TIMs by over ten times. Meanwhile, the highly flexible and foldable nature of vertical graphene enables at least 20% compressibility of the GTs upon small applied pressures ($\le$ 400 KPa). As excellent gap fillers, GT can provide complete physical contact between two surfaces and thereby minimize the contact resistance to heat flow. The measured minimum thermal resistance and maximum effective thermal conductivity for GTs reaches to $\sim $ Kmm$^{2}$/W and $\sim \mathrm{W} /$mK, respectively. Such values are significantly higher than the randomly dispersed composites presented above, and show almost comparable thermal performance as pure indium bonding. In addition, the GTs has more advantages than indium/solder bonding, including low weight (density $\lt2\mathrm{g} /$cm}$^{3}$), low complexity during assembly and maintainability. The resulting GTs thus opens new opportunities for addressing large heat dissipation issues both in through-plane and in-plane directions for form-factor driven electronics and other high power driven systems.

Copper is generally considered as an electronic packaging material due to its good electrical, thermal properties and relatively low cost. However, copper needs high processing temperature, which negatively affects the electronics reliability. In this paper, silver nanoparticles sintering is evaluated for the propose to decrease the processing temperature of copper. Different fractions of silver nanoparticles were mixed with 10 ×m Cu powder and sintered at temperatures of 250°C, 300°C, 400°C and 500°C, under low pressures 4MPa and 8MPa, and a high pressure of 100MPa for comparison. Densities from 45% to 94% of the density of bulk Cu have been achieved while the thermal and electrical conductivities have been evaluated and reached a value of around 270W/m.K and 1.41×106 S/m.

Following Moores law, the development of electronics has led to an exponential increase of transistor density over the last couple of decades. Unfortunately, this trend also gives an increased heat power density in active components. Thermal interface materials (TIMs) are used to decrease the thermal resistance in thermal packages by filling out air gaps that naturally form there. TIMs are at the same time identified as a bottleneck due to their relatively low thermal conductivity. Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are proposed as a future material for TIMs due to their high thermal conductivity and conformable nature. However, no reliability studies for CNT array TIMs can be found in literature that would demonstrate how these types of interfaces would perform. This is to the authors best knowledge the first reported study on thermal reliability for a CNT array TIM, which will be an important step towards a market realisation.

Nano-silver paste with low sintering temperature and high operation temperature was introduced to the application of bonding materials for GaN and SiC devices. Thermal properties are critical issues for die attach materials due to the heat dissipation requirements of high power devices. The influence of sintering process parameters for nano-silver paste on the thermal properties was investigated. The thermal conductivity of sintered nano-silver paste increased with the increase of sintering temperature and sintering time because of the dense structure due to high temperature and long sintering time. To improve the thermal property, Ag coated micro-SiC particles were used as an alternative to partly replace pure nano-Ag particles. The results demonstrate that the SiC particles can reduce the voids and improve the density of the sintered silver structure. Moreover, the addition of SiC particles can also contribute to the increase of thermal diffusivity. As a result, the thermal conductivity of sintered silver paste with 1.5 wt.% Ag coated SiC particles was two times as compared to that without SiC particles with the same Ag concentration.

A light-weight, robust and highly thermal conductive copper/graphene film laminated structure was developed as novel heat spreading materials for thermal management applications. The advantages of the copper/graphene film laminated structure lie in its ability to combine both good mechanical properties of metals and excellent thermal properties of graphene film. Graphene films (GFs) were fabricated via self-assembly of graphene oxide (GO) sheets and post-treated by high temperature graphitization and mechanical pressing. The resulted GFs show excellent flexibility and greatly improved tensile strength which is over 3 times higher than commercial PGS. The successful lamination between copper and GFs was realized by indium bonding. Thin indium layers can provide complete physical contact between copper and GFs, and thereby, minimize the contact resistance induced by surface roughness. The measured contact thermal resistance between copper and GFs bonded by indium is in the range of 2-5 Kmm2/W for a working temperature between 20 °C to 100°C. This value is orders magnitude lower than other bonding methods, including direct hot pressing of copper and GFs, tape bonding and thermal conductive adhesive (TCA) bonding. By tailoring the thickness of GFs, desirable laminated composites with optimized thermal conductivity can be obtained, which offers an efficient heat dissipation solution for power driven systems.

Graphene, the typical two-dimensional sp2 hybridized carbon allotrope, is widely used as a filler for improving the mechanical performance of polymers. However, its superhydrophobic surface makes it a big challenge to obtain stable graphene dispersions, especially in water-borne systems. On the contrary, graphene oxide (GO) shows excellent dispersibility in water, but strong oxidants and acids destroy its structure and degrade its mechanical properties. This largely limits its application in water-borne coatings. In this work, graphene from mechanical exfoliation was surface modified by p-aminophenol derived diazonium salt to achieve a homogenous dispersion. Moreover, the hydroxyl groups in p-aminophenol are able to combine with epoxy resins during the curing process to improve mechanical performance of the final coatings. The result shows that functionalized graphene shows a lower coefficient of friction and better abrasion resistance compared to GO.

Nanocomposite solders are regarded as one of the most promising interconnect materials for the high-density electronic packaging due to their high mechanical strength and fine microstructure. However, the developments of nanocomposite solders have been limited by the inadequate compatibility between nanoparticles and solder matrix with respect to density, hardness, coefficient of thermal expansion, and surface activity. The compatibility issue will lead to a huge loss of nanoparticles from the solder matrix after the reflow soldering process. The thermal fatigue resistance of solder joint will also become degraded. Therefore, aiming to solve this problem, a novel nanocomposite solder consisting of Bi2Te3 semiconductor nanoparticles and Sn–3.0Ag–0.5Cu (SAC305) solder is presented. The effect of nanoparticles on the viscosity of solder paste and the void content of solder bump was first studied. Then, a series of analysis on the composition and microstructure of the solder bump were completed using transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry, scanning electron microscopy, and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy. The survival rate of nanoparticles in the solder bump after reflow soldering process reaches as high as 80%. The refined microstructure was observed from the cross section of the nanocomposite solders. The shear test showed that the average mechanical strength of SAC305 solder after the addition of Bi2Te3 nanoparticles was higher. Meanwhile, no thermal fatigue resistance degradation was detected in the nanocomposite solder after 1000 thermal cycles in the range of −40 °C to 115 °C.

In this work, flexible multifunctionalized carbon nanotube (CNT)-based hybrid nanowires are synthesized through surface modification processes. The good dispersability of the hybrid nanowire in polar solvents facilitates directly making fine patterns with a minimum width of 40 μm for applications of flexible and stretchable circuits (FSCs). The hybrid nanowire possesses a flexible and highly conductive structure which demonstrates stable electro-mechanical properties on polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) substrates under large structural deformation. FSCs fabricated from the hybrid nanowires show a constant resistance of 0.096 Ω □-1 (equivalent of a resistivity 0.96 Ω μm) under repeated bending cycles. The FSCs also have a low and stable sheet resistance of 0.4 Ω □-1 for strains up to 30%, which is almost four orders of magnitude lower than that of pure CNT samples (1316 Ω □-1). Further improved stretchability and electro-mechanical properties (0.1 Ω □-1, at the strain of 100%) are achieved with a prestrain PDMS substrate. Repeated deformation tests demonstrate the high reliability of FSCs. The observed stable and reliable electro-mechanical performance of FSCs suggests the potential use of the material in wearable and portable electronics. Multifunctionalized hybrid nanowires based on carbon nanotubes are prepared through different surface modification processes. These hybrid nanowires exhibit both the high electrical conductivity of metal and excellent mechanical properties of carbon nanotubes together with good dispersability. Flexible and stretchable electrodes based on the hybrid nanowires demonstrate stable electro-mechanical properties under large structural deformations.

A silver alloyed n-type bismuth telluride (Bi2Te3) thermoelectric (TE) bulk material with nano crystalline structure was studied and characterized in this paper. The Bi2Te3 nanopowders used in this study were first fabricated via a patented explosion based process. Then, the various concentrations of Ag nanoparticles (0-20 wt. %) were added into the Bi2Te3 nanopowders in order to increase the electrical conductivity. Combining the benefits of high electrical conductivity (1.51x10(5) S.m(-1)) and low thermal conductivity (0.441 W.m(-1).K-1), the dimensionless figure of merit (ZT value) of 1.48 for this n-type Bi2Te3 TE material is achieved at 300 K temperature.

Electrically conductive adhesive is a new type of environmentally interconnect material which can be used in electronic packaging to replace the traditional solders due to its advantages of simple applying process and low curing temperature. Silver coated graphene is employed in this work to enhance the thermal conductivity of the current commercial electrically conductive adhesive with very low thermal conductivity. Thermal conductivity of the electrically conductive adhesive was measured by laser flash thermal analyzer. The infrared thermal imager was utilized to obtain the temperature distribution of chip surface. The results indicated that the developed graphene enhanced electrically conductive adhesive has perfect heat performances. It can be believed that this new kind of electrically conductive adhesive possesses promising application in electronic packaging in the future.

Graphene-based heat spreading materials, including graphene-based film (GBF) and graphene-based electrically conductive adhesive (G-CA), were applied to electronics packaging. The thermal performances of GBF and G-CA were analyzed by resistance temperature detector (RTD) and thermal infrared imager. When the chip was covered by GBF and G-CA, the temperature of hotspot could be reduced by 3.1°C, at heat flux of 580 W/cm2. To analyze the thermal performances of G-CA and GBF in 3D electronics packaging, the distribution of temperature and temperature profiles on the top surface of chip were analyzed by COMSOL. Both of GBF and G-CA could obviously reduce the temperature of hotspot on the top surface of chip, compared with that on the bare chip. With G-CA and GBF, the temperature of hotspot could be reduced by 8°C. It suggests that both of G-CA and GBF are good heat spreading materials for electronics packaging application.

In this work a Cu paste consisting in both micro and nanoparticles was produced. The copper paste was produced with different additive weight percentages of Ag coated SiC and sintered for 30min at 500°C under 6,5MPa in N 2 atmosphere. The thermal resistance and composition of the resulting joints was studied. XPS and EDX measurements show no significant oxidation of the Cu after sintering, which is attributed to the combination of reductive agents in the paste and the inert atmosphere. SEM images of cross sections show contacts with no voids between the SiC particles and the copper matrix. Thermal conductivity measurements with laser flash analysis (LFA) show that the additive increases the effective thermal conductivity to more than double of that of the pure copper paste at 2% additive weight percentage, but bigger amounts yield smaller improvements and presumably would eventually worsen it.

Graphene and CNT have great potential in electronics applications. This work explored the possibility of integrating 1D CNT and 2D graphene into a 3D covalently bonded structure, i.e. a graphene-CNT hybrid material for thermal management application. The graphene-CNT hybrid material was later investigated morphologically and thermally to observe its heat dissipation capability.