Medium and atmospheric pressure plasma treatment for improvement of adhesion of PDMS used for flexible and stretchable electronics

Stretchable electronics consist of a stretchable substrate material with embedded electronic components connected by electronic interconnections. Since little or no stretchable electronic components are available, it is vital to engineer electronic interconnections which are stretchable. Today metals (copper, nickel and gold) are the best option to realize the interconnections with high performance and low cost. However, metals are not intrinsically stretchable, therefore, a suitable design such as a meander-shaped horseshoe structure is necessary. This structure can be reproducibly stretched and released many times without breaking. Among the identified stretchable substrate materials appropriate for the fabrication of implantable electronic systems, polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) is one of the most promising due to its specific mechanical properties (compliance, softness) and its good biocompatibility.