Mediaspace scheduled maintenance: Aug 25, 2026 07:00 - 12:00 AM. During this time, videos will be temporarily unavailable. Check status updates.

Lecture

Micro Contact Printing: Basics and Applications

In course

MICRO-530: Nanotechnology

This course gives the basics for understanding nanotechnology from an engineer's perspective: physical background, materials aspects and scaling laws, fabrication and imaging of nanoscale devices. ...

Description

This lecture covers the fundamentals of microcontact printing (UCP), including the process of mold creation, polymerization, and stamping with ink solutions. It explores high-resolution UCP techniques, showcasing examples of stamp patterns and their corresponding printed features. The instructor discusses the importance of achieving conformal contact between soft stamps and hard substrates, highlighting the impact of stamp properties on the printing process. Various examples of layered hybrid stamps are presented, demonstrating their adaptability to different substrates. The lecture also addresses common problems and limitations in microcontact printing, such as lateral collapse and sagging. Additionally, the scope of the lecture includes an overview of nano-fabrication methods, focusing on achievements and challenges in the field.

This video is available exclusively on Mediaspace for a restricted audience. Please log in to MediaSpace to access it if you have the necessary permissions.

Watch on Mediaspace

Instructors (2)

Jürgen Brugger

I am a Professor of Microengineering and co-affiliated to Materials Science. Before joining EPFL I was at the MESA Research Institute of Nanotechnology at the University of Twente in the Netherlands, at the IBM Zurich Research Laboratory, and at the Hitachi Central Research Laboratory, in Tokyo, Japan. I received a Master in Physical-Electronics and a PhD degree from Neuchâtel University, Switzerland. Research in my laboratory focuses on various aspects of MEMS and Nanotechnology. My group contributes to the field at the fundamental level as well as in technological development, as demonstrated by the start-ups that spun off from the lab. In our research, key competences are in micro/nanofabrication, additive micro-manufacturing, new materials for MEMS, increasingly for wearable and biomedical applications. Together with my students and colleagues we published over 200 peer-refereed papers and I had the pleasure to supervise over 25 PhD students. Former students and postdocs have been successful in receiving awards and starting their own scientific careers. I am honoured for the appointment in 2016 as Fellow of the IEEE “For contributions to micro and nano manufacturing technology”. In 2017 my lab was awarded an ERC AdvG in the field of advanced micro-manufacturing.

Giovanni Boero

Official source

Related concepts (16)

Printing

Printing is a process for mass reproducing text and images using a master form or template. The earliest non-paper products involving printing include cylinder seals and objects such as the Cyrus Cylinder and the Cylinders of Nabonidus. The earliest known form of printing as applied to paper was woodblock printing, which appeared in China before 220 AD for cloth printing. However, it would not be applied to paper until the seventh century.

Printing press

A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium (such as paper or cloth), thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in which the cloth, paper, or other medium was brushed or rubbed repeatedly to achieve the transfer of ink and accelerated the process. Typically used for texts, the invention and global spread of the printing press was one of the most influential events in the second millennium.

Woodblock printing

Woodblock printing or block printing is a technique for printing text, s or patterns used widely throughout East Asia and originating in China in antiquity as a method of printing on textiles and later paper. Each page or image is created by carving a wooden block to leave only some areas and lines at the original level; it is these that are inked and show in the print, in a relief printing process. Carving the blocks is skilled and laborious work, but a large number of impressions can then be printed.

History of printing

The history of printing starts as early as 3000 BC, when the proto-Elamite and Sumerian civilizations used cylinder seals to certify documents written in clay tablets. Other early forms include block seals, hammered coinage, pottery imprints, and cloth printing. Initially a method of printing patterns on cloth such as silk, woodblock printing for texts on paper originated in China by the 7th century during the Tang dynasty, leading to the spread of book production and woodblock printing in other parts of Asia such as Korea and Japan.

Color printing

Color printing or colour printing is the reproduction of an image or text in color (as opposed to simpler black and white or monochrome printing). Any natural scene or color photograph can be optically and physiologically dissected into three primary colors, red, green and blue, roughly equal amounts of which give rise to the perception of white, and different proportions of which give rise to the visual sensations of all other colors. The additive combination of any two primary colors in roughly equal proportion gives rise to the perception of a secondary color.

Related lectures (29)

Patterning Techniques: Lithography and Printing

Explores patterning techniques for organic electronic devices, including lithography and printing methods.

Map Creation and Formatting MOOC: Geographical Information Systems 2

Covers cartography wrapping, composing documents, and exporting maps in various formats.

Large Area Electronic Materials: Introduction

Introduces large area electronic materials, discussing benefits, driving forces, TCOs, applications, and challenges.

Patterning Techniques for Organic Devices

Explores patterning techniques for organic devices, covering various methods and printing techniques with their limitations and process parameters.

Filament change: SPOT