Roll to Roll Fabrication and Processing Facility

Roll-to-Roll Fabrication and Processing Facility

Announcements

Core Facilities Seminar

Jeff Morse, Director–Scalable Fabrication of Flexible Hybrid Electronics (FHE): Unique Capabilities of the Advanced Print and Roll-to-Roll Facility

Replay on YouTube

Located on the 4th floor in the Life Science Laboratories the Roll to Roll Fabrication and Processing (R2R) facility provides a unique set of custom, moving web-based tools for the translation of advanced materials and nanomanufacturing processes to industrially relevant scalable platforms for the development of next generation life science innovations in biosensors, diagnostics, and platforms for personalized health monitoring. Combined with additional web-based tools for vacuum sputter deposition, reactive ion etching, wet chemistry, and interlayer alignment, providing access to an emerging set of tools not found anywhere else.

What We Do

In combination with supporting student researchers, the R2R facility provides the expertise of professional staff with years of experience in the coating and flexible electronics industries to meet the near term and future needs of industry in developing their next generation products. Contributing towards a significant economic impact in Massachusetts and nationally in working closely with industry partners to solve critical process bottlenecks, enabling critical demonstrations of prototype products, and working to scale these processes to pilot manufacturing. This unprecedented facility, within an academic institution, allows rapid development for small, medium, and large companies to develop products without the upfront capital equipment investment, or need to shut down a production line in order to develop next generation products. Thus, a new paradigm in advanced manufacturing is presented which becomes more efficient, and accelerates the timeline to manufacturing.

The impact has been clear, creating new jobs, attracting substantial investment, and creating partnerships and mergers between companies, and enhancing competitiveness throughout the value chain. While this impact is recognized across the range of applications for coatings and flexible electronics, the largest impact by far is in the energy and environmental application sector, thereby have a broader socioeconomic benefit. These include batteries and energy storage ultra filtration, carbon sequestration, and printed photonics. The figure to the right illustrates a coating in process on the Frontier Slot Die Coating system. Our staff work closely with industry partners and sponsors to optimize the coating process parameters, thereby establishing a baseline for pilot production and scaled manufacturing. In addition, our team woks closely with industry partners to run trials evaluating and optimizing formulation, process variations, and systematic configurations in order to provide a solid base to take this product to the next manufacturing level.


Work With Us

We offer training to users to develop processes and conduct experimentation for use on a fee for service basis to both internal and external researchers, academic or industry based. Following an initial consultation to better understand the user’s goals, process or device interests, suggested tool capabilities, experimental parameters, training and access is arranged through the director. Facility staff and faculty researchers are available to assist on an as-needed basis, or through collaborative programs leveraging targeted expertise. For further information, please contact the facility director.

  Campus Users Other Academic Institutions Industry
Analytical Equipment Access Tier 1 $25/hour $30/hour $45/hour
Specialized Equipment Tier 2 $50/hour $65/hour $85/hour
Specialized Equipment Tier 3
(Includes staff)
$75/hour $75/hour $120/hour
Technical Support/Training $60/hour $65/hour $100/hour
Access Fee $300 $400 $500/quarter
 
Tier 1 Equipment
  • Woollam - RC2 Vertical Spectroscopic Ellipsometer
  • Zygo Corp - Nexview 3D Optical Profiler
  • Perkin Elmer - Lambda 1050 UV/Vis/NIR Wide Band Spectrophotometer
  • Janis Research - Cryogenic Probe Station
  • Tektronix/Keithley - Semiconductor Parameter Analyzer
  • Netzsch - MiniCer Agitator Bead System
  • Olympus - MX61 Microscope
  • Biolin Scientific - Sigma 700 Force Tensiometer
  • MBRAUN - Labmaster DP Glove Box Workstation
  • Bruker - Dektak Nano Stylus Profiler
  • NIL Technologies
  • RheoSense - m-VROC Viscometer
  • Filmetrics - F40-UV Thin Film Microscope
  • PerkinElmer - Frontier MIR/FIR Spectrometer
  • Flacktek - Speedmixer DAC 600
  • Brewer Science Incorporated
  • PerkinElmer - LS-55 Fluorescence Spectrometer
  • Piezotest Piezometer
  • Xenon Corporation
  • Silverson - L5M-A Laboratory Mixer
  • Future Digital Scientific Corporation
  • BYK-Gardner - Balanced Beam Scrape Adhesion and Mar Tester
  • Signatone - Semiconductor Probe Station
  • Techni-Tool
  • Gamry - Reference 600 High-Performance Potentiostat/Galvanostat/ZRA
  • Simco-Ion - Static Control System
  • IKA - Eurostar Mixer
  • SPEX SamplePrep - 8000M High-Energy Ball Mill
  • Sartorius Cubis - High Capacity Balance MSA10202S-000-D0
  • Sartorius Mark 3 Moisture Analyzer
  • Elec. Instrumentation and Tech LLC
  • Matsusada Precision Inc.
  • Spiral Binding
  • ramé-hart Model 210 Goniometer / Tensiometer

Tier 2 Equipment

  • Nanonex Corporation - Wafer Based NIL System
  • MBRAUN - Glovebox Large
  • Optomec - Aerosol Jet Digital Printing
  • Novacentrix - Pulseforge 1300 Photonic Cure
  • FUJIFILM Dimatix - Inkjet Printer
  • ADT - Dicing Saw
  • Allied High Tech Products - Wafer Polisher
  • HMI - Flatbed Screenprint
  • Dry Room

Tier 3 Equipment

  • Carpe Diem Tool Suite
  • Frontier - Slot die, Microgravure Coater/Laminator
  • BESI - Automated Pick and Place Tool
  • AJA International - R2R Sputtering System
  • Trion Technology - Pulsar III R2R DRIE System
  • JST Manufacturing - R2R Wet Chemistry
  • Northfield - R2R Slitter/Laminator
  • Novacentrix - R2R Pulseforge 1300 Photonic Cure
Rates are subject to change, contact facility to verify current fees.

FY24 Specialized Service Center Approved Fees

Services

Training for new users consists of:

  • lab safety training,
  • operation of the instrument and associated software,
  • use of data analysis software,
  • exporting or presenting data,
  • clean up and shutdown of the instrumentation.

Once the training is complete, users may schedule their activities and tool use with the director of R2R (Jeff Morse) or online through CORUM at corum.umass.edu

Roll-to-Roll Fabrication & Processing (R2R) Facility: the R2R facility provides a unique set of custom, moving web-based tools for the translation of advanced materials and nanomanufacturing processes to industrially relevant scalable platforms for the development of next generation life science innovations in biosensors, diagnostics, and platforms for personalized health monitoring. Combined with additional web-based tools for vacuum sputter deposition, reactive ion etching, wet chemistry, and interlayer alignment, providing access to an emerging set of tools not found anywhere else.

  • Training: Training for new users consists of: lab safety training, operation of the instrument and associated software, use of data analysis software, exporting or presenting data, clean up and shutdown of the instrumentation. Rates currently under review.

FY24 Specialized Service Center Approved Fees

Updated July 2023