Liquid in Circuits
The Challenge
Led by Professor Yi Wang of the Emerging Device Technology research lab at the University of Birmingham, this project seeks to make flexible electronic circuits using liquid metals more widely available. Liquid offers the benefit of natural flexibility and can be paired with similarly flexible circuits and sensors, allowing for greater flexibility than is currently achieved with conventional flexible electronics made from thinned conductors, dielectrics, and conductive textiles. Liquid metals like the non-toxic gallium-indium alloy can take the place of solid conductors in flexible circuits, allowing for greater stretching and bending. Liquid metal circuits have the potential to be more durable than conventional alternatives, as well as being more sustainable thanks to the fact that the self-repairing nature of liquids leads to a reduction in e-waste.
While liquid metal circuits have been successfully demonstrated in a number of research studies, challenges remain in bringing them to device-making communities in the form of consumable products.
The Solution
This project will seek to overcome two challenges currently preventing the widespread adoption of liquid metals in flexible electronics and sensors. The first of these is improving the reliability of flexible microfluidic channels for use with liquid metals. The second challenge will be to find a solution for maintaining the performance of flexible electronics under stretching or bending forces.
This project is further supported by Doctors Yi-Wen Wu and Tim Cole of the University of Birmingham and Associate Professor Shiyang Tang of the University of Southampton.
The project was successful in responding to the pro² network’s 2024 funding call ‘Materials for Digital Devices‘, which funded projects exploring the use of emerging materials, or novel applications of existing materials, for digital devices.
