Development of Corrugated Ceramic Sheet for SOFC Electrolyte by Micro Imprint Process

Abstract

Yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ) has been used for an electrolyte of solid oxide fuel cells (SOFC). To enhance the efficiency of SOFC, we developed a corrugated, or wavy-shaped, YSZ sheet for the electrolyte. As the corrugated sheet has larger surface area than a flat-type sheet, higher energy density can be obtained. We have proposed micro powder imprint (μPI) with multi-layer imprint process to fabricate micro scale pattern on the both surfaces of a thin YSZ sheet. The μPI is a combined process of nano imprint lithography and powder metallurgy; the resolution is high, and the process is mass-productive. In this work, we selected a compound material containing YSZ powder and a binder consisting of thermoplastic resin as a starting material. The compound sheet was prepared by tape casting from slurry and was imprinted by a fine-patterned mold with stacked on a silicone rubber sheet. The silicone rubber was so flexible that micro patterns on the both sides of the compound sheet was obtained after imprint. In the present work, the process condition of μPI and the heat program of debinding and sintering were also considered. As a result, a wave-type sintered YSZ sheet without significant defects was successfully obtained.

Study of the Antifouling Polymer Sheet which used Biomimetics Technique

“…One method of creating a mold with biomimetic structure is to coat a Si substrate with ZrO 2 nanoparticles using a binder, which is then sintered at high temperature to produce a nano-porous structure. In the present study, we used TZ-8Y, a zirconia powder manufactured by Tosoh Corporation, as the ZrO 2 nanoparticles [5]. The TZ-8Y is a powder product consisting of ZrO 2 particles with grain diameter of approximately 100 nm, dispersed as a solid solution in 8 mol% yttria.…”

Finite Element Analysis of Advanced Imprint Process to Multilayered Material

“…Recently, authors developed some new fabrication methods based on NIL to fabricate more complex structures. Our newly proposed processing methods are named multi-layer imprinting (MLI) [5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16] and in-plain compression imprinting (IPI) [17][18][19].…”

Combining multi-step imprinting with the in-plane compression method

“…Micro powder imprinting (PI) [16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26] was initially used in this study. Thermo-plastic polymer materials are generally used for thermal imprinting; however, an imprinting process using inorganic materials that can be utilized to fabricate ceramic products with fine patterns was developed for this study.…”