Additive Manufacturing of Optoelectronic Functional Thin Films and Devices

Optoelectronic functional films and devices are widely used for applications in flat display, solid-state lighting, information transmission and storage, new energy and photochemistry. The research highlights in this field rely on developing protocols for further improving their performance. Additive manufacture, that is 3D printing as a simple, high-precision, no mold-required, material-saving, personalized and batch-oriented intelligent fabrication technology, has attracted recent attention. This review reported the major additive manufacture techniques for developing optoelectronic functional films and devices and their research progress via highlighting inkjet printing, electrohydrodynamic printing and direct writing capable of printing optoelectronic functional films with three-dimensional structures and deliberating the challenges in realizing complex shape and in-situ multiscale modulation in microstructure. Aerosol jet printing was emphasized with great potential for simultaneously controlling the nano-and micro-structures during printing optoelectronic functional films via exploiting the microreactor capabilities of aerosols. Carbon-based materials and MXene were taken as examples for demonstrating the functionality and applicability of additive manufacture techniques in printing optoelectronic functional films and devices. Recent studies on the additive manufacturing of advanced optoelectronic functional materials and devices were summarized, i.e., developing new material and ink formulation, printing process control and new additive manufacturing processes. In addition, the future development was also prospected for next-generation additive manufacture protocols endowing the functionality of in-situ multiscale modulation of microstructures during the printing process, thus favoring the development of high-performance optoelectronic functional materials and devices in the future.