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Transparent Conducting Coatings on Polymer Substrates for Touchscreens and Displays

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Handbook of Visual Display Technology

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Abstract

There has been an interest in using polymer films as an alternative to glass substrates and so this section should be viewed as being complementary to the chapters “Indium Tin Oxide (ITO): Sputter Deposition Processes,” “ITO Replacements: Carbon Nanotubes,” “ITO Replacements: Polymers Indium Tin Oxide (ITO),” and “ITO Replacements: Insulator-Metal-Insulator Layers” that cover coatings onto glass substrates. The polymer substrates have the potential to reduce the manufacturing costs by using roll-to-roll processing. The polymer also has improved flexibility, making the final display more robust to accidental damage and reduces the weight of the final product. Many touchscreens are constructions where two transparent conducting coatings are placed facing each other but separated by an array of small spacer dots. As one of the transparent coated films is pressed and distorted it contacts the other conducting film making electrical contact and completing the circuit. Thus having a robust transparent conducting coating on a flexible polymer substrate has a ready-made market so long as it can meet the required specification. The polymers have to be coated at a lower temperature than glass making the transparent conducting coatings less conducting or transparent than can be achieved on glass and so there is a trade-off of properties. As the coating performance improves and the yield and costs reduce the move to polymer substrates is expected to increase. This chapter highlights the basics of vacuum deposition of transparent conducting coatings onto polymer substrates.

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Abbreviations

AZO:

Aluminium doped Zinc Oxide

CIGS:

Copper Indium Gallium Diselenide

CIS:

Copper Indium Diselenide

CNT:

Carbon Nanotubes

ITO:

Indium Tin Oxide

MWCNT or MWNT:

MultiWall Carbon Nanotubes

PEDOT:PSS:

Polyethylene-dioxythiophene: polystyrene sulphonic acid

PEN:

Polyester naphthalate

PET:

Polyester terephthalate

ppm:

Parts per million

RI:

Refractive Index

SWCNT or SWNT:

Single Wall Carbon Nanotubes

TCO:

Transparent conducting oxide

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. C.A. Bishop Consulting Ltd, 5, Church Side, LE12 9RL, Shepshed, Nr. Loughborough, Leicestershire, UK

    Charles A. Bishop

Authors
  1. Charles A. Bishop
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Correspondence to Charles A. Bishop .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Display Technology Center, Panel Integration Division I, Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI), Chutung, Hsinchu, Taiwan

    Janglin Chen

  2. Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, United Kingdom

    Wayne Cranton

  3. Veritas et Visus, Temple, Texas, USA

    Mark Fihn

Additional information

In addition journals such as Thin Sold Films & J. Vacuum Science & Technology and proceedings of conferences such as the Annual technical conferences for the Society of Vacuum Coaters (SVC) and Association of Industrial Metallizers, Coaters and Laminators (AIMCAL) have a good supply of useful papers.

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Bishop, C.A. (2016). Transparent Conducting Coatings on Polymer Substrates for Touchscreens and Displays. In: Chen, J., Cranton, W., Fihn, M. (eds) Handbook of Visual Display Technology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-14346-0_64

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