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pps proceeding
Symposium: S14 - Material Technologies for Sustainability
Oral Presentation
 
 

Constant-Temperature Embossing of Supercooled Polymer Films

Kuduva-Raman-Thanumoorthy Ramasubramani (1), Yao Donggang (2)*

(1) 3M - MN - USA, (2) Georgia Instiute of Technology - GA - USA

The work describes the development of a new type of hot embossing process called Constant Temperature Embossing (CTE) and compares its characteristics against the conventional hot embossing process. The process utilizes the crystallizing nature of supercooled amorphous polymers such as poly (ethylene terephthalate) (PET), poly (ether ether ketone) PEEK and poly (ethylene naphthalate) (PEN) when heated above their glass transition temperature to complete the embossing without a cooling step. The embossed films were characterized for their replication fidelity and accuracy. This presentation details the experimental part of the study including development of the process, CTE studies with amorphous PET and PEEK films as model materials and the morphological characterization of the embossed films. The current research has enabled a new process for isothermal patterning utilizing an inherent material property of certain classes of polymers, without the need for thermal cycling.