Roll-to-roll manufacture of microstructured metamaterials films

Metamaterials are man-made structures composed of tailored micro-/nanostructured building blocks that are much smaller than the wavelength of light. Potential payoffs of these artificially engineered structures include subwavelength resolution imaging, invisibility cloaking, and omnidirectional absorbers. To date, metamaterials have been mostly produced on small scales in universities. One of the long-standing challenges of metamaterials is to cost-effectively manufacture subwavelength structures in large-areas for practical applications. Physical Sciences Inc. (PSI) proposes to develop an innovative low-cost roll-to-roll (R2R) pilot line for large-scale manufacturing of metamaterials. The key innovation is the integration of PSI"s proprietary low-cost, high-throughput manufacturing processes as modules in its existing R2R line. Unlike existing R2R schemes, no optical lithography, imprint lithography or hot embossing are required for pattern replication. Therefore, no UV exposure, pressure considerations, heat treatment or special thermal-curable photoresist are needed. Also, no vacuum deposition of metal or complicated plating equipment is required to metalize the structures. Our proposed approach considerably simplifies the technical and process challenges of competing R2R lines and consequently reduces the overall cost significantly. The added benefit is a ~tenfold increase in production speed compared to competitor technologies. The proposed demonstration application is a broadband and conformal radar-absorbing curtain.