Applicability of Metallic Nanoparticle Inks in RFID Applications

Author

Allen, Mark L. ; Jaakkola, Kaarle ; Nummila, Kaj ; Seppä, Heikki

Author_Institution

Sensors Center, VTT Tech. Res. Center of Finland, Espoo, Finland

Volume

32

Issue

2

fYear

2009

fDate

6/1/2009 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

325

Lastpage

332

Abstract

Radio frequency identification (RFID) antennas for HF and UHF frequencies are ink-jet printed using commercially available silver nanoparticle ink. Quality factors of 5.3 and 9.4 are obtained for coil antennas targeted for 13.56 MHz when the printing and sintering process is repeated two and three times, respectively. The measured maximum effective aperture of the printed UHF antenna is only some decibels lower than that of an equivalent etched copper antenna and the maximum reading distance with 0.5 W (ERP) transmitted power is 3 m for continuous reading. These results suggest that obtaining a low enough series resistance for printed coils is challenging while printed RFID antennas for UHF do not set as strict requirements on conductivity. With a perfectly optimized structure, a UHF tag antenna printed in just one layer of ink can be practically equal in performance with the traditional etched copper and aluminum tags.

Keywords

HF antennas; Q-factor; UHF antennas; etching; ink jet printing; microstrip antennas; nanoparticles; radiofrequency identification; silver; sintering; Ag; HF antennas; UHF tag antennas; coil antennas; continuous reading; distance 3 m; frequency 13.56 MHz; metallic nanoparticle inks; power 0.5 W; printed RFID antennas; printing process; quality factors; radio frequency identification; silver; sintering process; Ink-jet; nanoparticle ink; printed antenna; radio frequency identification (RFID);

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Components and Packaging Technologies, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1521-3331

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TCAPT.2008.2010505

Filename

4801564