(a) Field of the Invention
A conductive ink composition, a method for manufacturing the same, and a method for manufacturing a conductive thin film using the same are provided.
(b) Description of the Related Art
In the existing semiconductor process, a circuit board is a board wherein a circuit pattern for electrically connecting a circuit device is formed on an insulation substrate formed of bakelite or synthetic resin, and the manufacturing method is largely divided into a subtractive method and an additive method.
The subtractive method is a method of removing parts excluding a required circuit pattern by etching and the like after wholly forming a conductive thin film on a substrate, and the additive method is a method of directly forming a circuit pattern on a substrate by plating or printing.
At present, most circuit boards are manufactured by etching, which is a representative subtractive method. According to the etching, a copper foil is laminated on an insulation substrate to form a laminate, an acid resistant material (resist) is coated only on a part corresponding to a circuit pattern on the surface of the laminate, and then parts other than the circuit pattern are dissolved to remove them, thereby forming a circuit pattern.
However, when a circuit board is manufactured by etching, since a complicated processes including formation of a laminate, resist coating, resist etching and washing, and the like should be conducted, a lot of time is consumed for the manufacturing process and production cost may increase.
Further, a discharged solution generated during the manufacturing process causes environmental problems, and to prevent this, treatment such as neutralization and the like is essentially involved, which also causes a cost increase.
The additive method is an alternative for solving the drawbacks of the circuit board manufacturing process by etching, and is a method of directly printing conductive ink on a substrate by printing such as inket printing to embody a circuit pattern, thus easily and inexpensively manufacturing a circuit board.
Since the additive method may print with a desired thickness at desired position, simplify the manufacturing process, reduce production cost, and does not cause environmental problems, the application range is being broadened.
In the additive method, ink sintering may be largely divided into heat sintering and laser sintering.
However, since commercially available heat sintering and laser sintering methods require high energy and a long sintering time, problems such as cost increase are raised.
Accordingly, the inventors studied a conductive ink composition suitable for an additive method (e.g., inket printing method), a manufacturing method of the same, and a method for effectively sintering a pattern formed using the ink.