Speaker: Pål Morten Lindberget | Company: CondAlign AS | Date: 11-12 May 2021 | Full Presentation CondAlign’s technology represents a novel process for production of anisotropic, conductive films. Using an electric field to structure and align particles, the results in a z-axis conductive film structure. One product type we can produce is anisotropic conductive adhesive (ACA) films with thicknesses from a few µm to some hundreds µm and resistance below 0,01 Ohm/cm^2. With very high chain densities (pitch below 10µm), these films are currently being tested in several bonding processes, like FOB, FOF, COB, COF, as an alternative to traditional ACF. The process is demonstrated in roll-to-roll production, proofing it is scalable and cost effective. Morten Lindberget VP Business Development @ CondAlign Bio An enabler with 25 years international experience from leadership, sales and business development roles in technology consulting, contract manufacturing, medical device technology and scale up. Morten holds a MSc in Mech. Engineering from TU Delft, the Netherlands, and an Executive Master of Management from BI, Norway. Join TechBlick on an annual pass to join all live online conference or online version of onsite conference access library of on-demand talks (600 talks + PDFs) portfolio of expert led masterclass year-round platform https://www.techblick.com/ And do NOT miss our flagship event in Berlin on 17-18 OCT 2023 focused on Reshaping the Future of Electronics. This event...

Human body communication (HBC) that takes advantage of the most conductive features of body tissues can provide highly secure and power-efficient data transmission among wearable, implanted and ingested medical devices, KAUST researchers have published this work "The Internet of Bodies: A Systematic Survey on Propagation Characterization and Channel Modeling" in IEEE Internet of Things Journal. The findings open the way for the interconnection of long-lasting wireless devices as the foundation for the internet of bodies (IoB). The internet of things (IoT) is a technology framework in which a myriad of devices can be interconnected to provide seamless functionality and unprecedented depth of data on the world around us. Autonomous vehicles and smart homes, for example, rely on IoT technologies for monitoring and control. But what if the same idea could be applied to monitoring our own bodies and alerting us to health signals? That is the concept behind the IoB.
“The IoB is a network of wearable, implantable, ingestible and injectable smart objects that allows for in-, on- and off-body communications,” says Ahmed Eltawil. “For example, smartwatches, smart shoes, pacemakers, and cochlear implants could be interconnected to monitor our biomarkers.”
However, interconnecting these devices using radio waves like those used in Wifi networks — the conventional go-to technology for such applications — can produce stray outward signals that could allow eavesdropping or biohacking, as ...

An electrode coating just one molecule thick can significantly enhance the performance of an organic photovoltaic cell, KAUST researchers have found. The coating outperforms the leading material currently used for this task and may pave the way for improvements in other devices that rely on organic molecules, such as light-emitting diodes and photodetectors. The work "18.4 % Organic Solar Cells Using a High Ionization Energy Self-Assembled Monolayer as Hole-Extraction Interlayer" was published in Chemistry–Sustainability–Energy–Materials Journal. Unlike the most common photovoltaic cells that use crystalline silicon to harvest light, organic photovoltaic cells (OPVs) rely on a light-absorbing layer of carbon-based molecules. Although OPVs cannot yet rival the performance of silicon cells, they could be easier and cheaper to manufacture at a very large scale using printing techniques. When light enters a photovoltaic cell, its energy frees a negative electron and leaves behind a positive gap, known as a hole. Different materials then gather the electrons and holes and guide them to different electrodes to generate an electrical current. In OPVs, a material called PEDOT: PSS is widely used to ease the transfer of generated holes into an electrode; however, PEDOT: PSS is expensive, acidic, and can degrade the cell’s performance over time. The KAUST team has now developed a better alternative to PEDOT: PSS. They use a much thinner coating of a hole-transporting molecule called Br...

Elitac Wearables & UMC Utrecht developed a smart shirt that helps guide neurosurgeons during skull base surgery to prevent damage to critical structures such as veins and nerves. Neuroimaging and navigation are widely used for drilling tasks in skull base surgery: It involves generating an individualized anatomical view of the patient beforehand and then tracking the surgeon’s drill bit relative to critical structures on a screen during surgery.
It is very beneficial in helping surgeons avoid damaging critical structures, but its major drawback is that surgeons must keep switching between the microscope view of the patient and the neuronavigation screen. This constant switching between views during complicated and 7+ hour-long procedures may cause fatigue and therefore, surgical errors. ​ How does the NeuroShirt solve this problem? It connects to the neuronavigation system and continuously indicates both the distance and direction of critical structures through haptic feedback (vibrations). This way, surgeons no longer have to split their focus between patient and screen. Benefits
Decreased likelihood of surgical errors due to fatigue
Haptic feedback minimizes the need to keep switching views, and therefore reduces fatigue and the risk of surgical errors.
Real-time, continuous haptic feedback
No interruptions because the surgeon is switching between views.
Distance AND direction of critical structures
The NeuroShirt conveys information about both the distance and dir...

A new organic (carbon-based) semiconducting material has been developed that outperforms existing options for building the next generation of biosensors. An international research team led by KAUST is the first to overcome some critical challenges in developing this polymer. The work "Regiochemistry-Driven Organic Electrochemical Transistor Performance Enhancement in Ethylene Glycol-Functionalized Polythiophenes" was published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society Much research effort is currently expended into novel types of biosensors that interact directly with the body to detect key biochemicals and serve as indicators of health and disease. “For a sensor to be compatible with the body, we need to use soft organic materials with mechanical properties that match those of biological tissues,” says Rawad Hallani, a former research scientist in the KAUST team, who developed the polymer along with researchers at several universities in the U.S. and the U.K. Hallani explains that the polymer is designed for use in devices called organic electrochemical transistors (OECTs). For these types of devices, the polymer should allow specific ions and biochemical compounds to permeate into the polymer and dope it, which in turn can modulate its electrochemical semiconducting properties. “The fluctuation in the electrochemical properties is what we are actually measuring as an output signal of the OECT,” he says. The team had to confront several chemical challenges because eve...

KAUST scientists have created micrometer-scale light-emitting diodes of unprecedented small size that could be used in mobile phone screens or televisions. They published their work "630-nm red InGaN micro-light-emitting diodes (<20 μm × 20 μm) exceeding 1 mW/mm2 for full-color micro-displays" in Photonics Research journal. Micrometer-scale light-emitting diodes (μLEDs) are the ideal building block for next-generation microLED displays used in head-mounted monitors, mobile phones, and televisions because they are bright, respond quickly, offer longevity, and consume little energy. KAUST researchers have shown that these scaled-down devices can efficiently emit light across the entire visible light spectrum. Just as with conventional LED displays, full-color μLEDs products will require arrays of blue, green, and red light sources. Nitride-based alloys are a group of semiconducting materials that offer one route to achieving this because, with the right chemical mix, they can emit all three colors. However, when nitride devices are reduced in size to micrometer scales, they become very poor emitters of light. “The main obstacle to reducing the size of the devices is the damage to the sidewalls of the LED structure generated during the fabrication process,” explains Ph.D. student Martin Velazquez-Rizo. “Defects provide an electrical path for a leakage current that does not contribute to the light emission.” This effect gets worse as the size of the LED shrinks, which has lim...

Printed/flexible electronics have long been touted as the technology that will make electronics ubiquitous. Promised applications include wireless sensors in packaging, skin patches that communicate with the internet, and buildings that detect leaks to enable preventative maintenance. However, until recently such applications have largely remained in the prototyping and development stages.
However, 2021 has been an exciting year for printed electronics, with multiple applications reaching commercial adoption and significant funds flowing into the sector. Even where technologies are not yet commercialized, companies are increasingly transitioning from developing their technology and producing speculative demonstration prototypes to development and qualification projects for specific customers. Healthcare/wellness: Utilizing flexibility Successfully commercializing printed/flexible electronics requires identifying applications where its differences from conventional electronics add significant value. Electronic skin patches are a great example of this, with flexible thin-film devices improving patient comfort while enabling continuous monitoring of biometric parameters.
Interest in electronic skin patches has really accelerated in 2021, with dedicated material portfolios being developed by major players such as Dupont and Henkel, and the patches being utilized in hospitals. This uptake in traction is partially attributed to COVID-19 since both patients and healthcare pro...

KAUST scientists have developed a simple cooling system driven by the capture of passive solar energy could provide low-cost food refrigeration and living space cooling for impoverished communities with no access to the electricity grid. The system, which has no electrical components, exploits the powerful cooling effect that occurs when certain salts are dissolved in water. After each cooling cycle, the system uses solar energy to evaporate the water and regenerate the salt, ready for reuse. The work was published in the Energy & Environmental Science journal "Conversion and storage of solar energy for cooling" “Hot regions have high levels of solar energy, so it would be very attractive to use that solar energy for cooling,” says Wenbin Wang, a postdoc in Peng Wang’s lab. In many parts of the world, there is a greater need for cooling because of climate change, but not every community can access electricity for air conditioning and refrigeration. “We conceptualized an off-grid solar-energy conversion and storage design for green and inexpensive cooling,” Professor Wang says. The team designed a two-step cooling and regeneration system, with the cooling step based upon the fact that dissolving certain common salts in water absorbs energy, which rapidly cools the water. After comparing a range of salts, ammonium nitrate (NH4NO3) proved to be the standout performer, with a cooling power more than four times greater than its closest competitor, ammonium chloride (NH4Cl). The am...