Suitability of roll-to-roll reverse offset printing for mass production of millimeter-wave antennas: Progress report

In this work, we investigate different printing technologies suitable for mass production of millimeter-wave antennas and other devices, e.g., holograms and frequency selective absorbers, on flexible substrates. We concentrate especially on roll-to-roll reverse offset printing. The driving factors are low cost, high accuracy, high efficiency, and reliable performance. Therefore, we need to find and characterize suitable flexible substrates (permittivity and loss tangent at mm-wavelengths), conducting inks (viscosity, surface resistance of the resulting conducting layer), adhesion of the ink to the substrate, and feature size capable for printing mm-wave antennas and other passive devices in high volumes.