Graphene is a fascinating material, with unique properties making it a sort of “wonder” material. Superb strength and conductivity are but two of its calling cards, the latter of which makes it interesting as a conductive ink.

The Graphene Flagship is the premiere research project when it comes to graphene. When it comes to graphene-based ink and its exploitations for electro/optical applications, this EU-wide project headquartered at Chalmers University with members from countless universities throughout Europe, has many experts. They include Professor Gianluca Fiori of the University of Pisa; Professor Cinzia Casiraghi of the University of Manchester; and Dr. Francesco Bonaccorso of BeDimensional.

“I would like to stress that there is a huge activity going on within the Graphene Flagship on the fabrication of graphene-inks and their exploitation in several applications,” Dr. Fiori noted.

The following updates were provided by members of the graphene ink research at the Graphene Flagship.


Printed Electronics Now: What would be the advantages of graphene-based inks?

Graphene Flagship: As compared to other available conductive inks such as metallic inks or carbon-based inks, graphene-based inks possess added values – for example, high processability and extraordinary physical properties like mechanical strength, good electrical and thermal conductivity, and good barrier properties, just to cite a few, which are hard to be found at the same time in the same material.

In addition, from an electrical point of view, graphene is not a real metal but rather a semi-metal, i.e., the carrier population can be modulated through an external electric field/ forces, which can open novel applications from the electronic point of view (printed strain gauge, electro-optical modulator, photodetectors etc.)


Printed Electronics Now: How is work progressing on the development of graphene-based conductive inks?

Graphene Flagship: Nowadays, graphene ink production is well established, and many graphene inks can already be found in the market. In particular, graphene-based inks have been optimised (as for example in terms of the rheology) depending on the the final applications and printing process and are currently commercialised. Actually, more efforts have to be put in improving ink characterisation while developing industrial standards (e.g. ISO, etc).

From the electrical point of view, conductivity is still below the one obtained in metallic inks, and sometime post-processing is needed (as for example post-annealing), which can limit the variety of substrates one can use (depending on its thermal budget, for example).


Printed Electronics Now: What do you see as the key markets where graphene-based inks could be utilized?

Graphene Flagship: The main markets and applications where graphene-based inks could play an important role are the ones concerned with printed electronics, energy storage/conversion devices (e.g., supercapacitors and batteries, solar cells), smart textiles (e.g., e-textile), and smart coatings (e.g., anticorrosion coatings). They could also play a key role in the emerging markets of Internet-of-Things (IoT), wearables and disposable devices, and biomedical devices.


Printed Electronics Now: What are the challenges that remain in developing graphene-based inks?

Graphene Flagship: In the short term, the main issues to be solved are concerned with the price of high-quality inks, which can still represent a high barrier for their exploitation in applications such as printed electronics. Improving the electrical conductivity would also be an important problem to tackle in order to fully unleash graphene inks’ potential for industrial applications.


Printed Electronics Now: Are products using graphene-based inks already in commercial use?

Graphene Flagship: As stated before, the answer is yes. For example, graphene inks are available in online stocks from Sigma-Aldrich. Another example is represented by the products delivered by the Graphene Flagship spin-off BeDimensional.


Printed Electronics Now:When might we see mainstream use of graphene-based conductive inks?

Graphene Flagship: Probably (and hopefully) in the next three years.