Abstract - Bruno Andò

In the last decades, there has been a growing interest in disposable and low-cost sensors for several applications such as biochemical sensing in medicine, chemistry and physics. Such interest is justified by the increasing needs of devices that can efficiently work in hostile environments or can suffer for irreversible (chemical or physical) processes that could compromise permanently their functionalities. These applications require low-cost sensing elements realized by cheap materials compatible with addressed applications, especially when contaminants, irreversible processes, or harsh environments are involved.
Joining the need for low-cost devices, flexible substrates and mesoscale development, printed technology, and plastic or polymeric substrates could represent a convenient choice for the realization of mass sensors.
Recently, the scientific community has shown a growing interest in the possibility of developing cheap flexible electronics by exploiting innovative materials and printing technologies. This interest is driven by several reasons such as the need for low-cost mass-production processes, applications requiring shapeable and disposable devices, and the need of fast prototyping of electronics and sensors, which is of great interest for the scientific community as a whole.
Among techniques for the rapid prototyping of sensors, such as screen printing and inkjet printing, the latter has unique advantages such as high spatial resolution, the compatibility with many substrates, the contactless deposition technique, the rapid prototyping due to the absence of masks and the inks’ saving as respect to the screen printed technology.
Inkjet printing technology affords the possibility of combining performances of flexible substrates and functional inks, with applications requiring the rapid development of sensors and electronic components.
This lecture aims to provide a review of inkjet printing technologies, with particular regards to the development of sensors. Real examples of IJP technologies and devices realization will be offered.

Bruno Andò (IEEE M’97-SM’13) received the M.S. in Electronic Engineering and the Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Catania, Italy, in 1994 and 1999 respectively. Currently he is an associate professor in measurement science at the Electric, Electronic and Information Engineering Department of the University of Catania. From 1999 he worked as a researcher with the Electrical and Electronic Measurement Group, within the same department of the University of Catania. His main research interests are sensors design and optimization, rapid prototyping of sensors, new materials for sensors, smart multi-sensor architectures for environmental monitoring and Assistive Technology, nonlinear techniques for signal processing. Currently, he is Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurements and the Editor In Chief of the IEEE Instrumentation and Measurements Magazine.
During his activity Dr. Andò has co-authored several scientific papers, presented in international conferences and published in international journals and books.