TY - CONF A1 - Heuser, Lina A1 - Nofz, Marianne A1 - Müller, Ralf A1 - Deubener, J. T1 - Sintering of silver‑alkali zinc borate glass‑composites N2 - Since decades electric contacts based on silver metallization pastes are key components of photovoltaics and advanced microelectronics. For the metallization of commercial Si solar cells, high conductive silver glass pastes are cost effectively applicated by screen printing. Nevertheless, silver pastes are still one of the most crucial and expensive none Si materials in solar cells. Ever shorter time to market as well as increasing demands on reduced Ag consumption and line width require the targeted development of silver-glass-pastes with increased sinter ability and electrical conductivity. As a main difficulty, however, the liquid phase sintering of silver glass pastes is poorly understood so far. In the present study, the influence of different network modifier in alkali-zinc-borate paste glasses on liquid phase sintering of silver-glass-pastes was investigated. Low melting X2O-ZnO-B2O3 glasses with X = Na, Li and Rb (abbr. LZB, NZB, and RZB) were utilized to prepare silver-glass-composites containing 30 %Vol glass. Shrinkage behavior of the silver-glass-composites compared with that of pure silver and pure glass powder compacts was studied with heating microscopy. The powder compacts were uniaxially pressed and heated at 5 K/min to the glass softening temperature. Glass transformation temperature and viscosity of the glasses were respectively measured with dilatometry and rotational viscometry. The thermal behavior of the pure glasses was analyzed with thermal analysis. Additionally, the contact angle of glass on pure silver foil was determined by means of heating microscopy between room temperature and 830 °C. Thermal analysis of the alkali-zinc-borate-glasses under study has shown transformation temperatures between 450 °C (RZB), 460 °C (LZB) and 465 °C (NZB). For all glasses crystallization was found to start approximately at about 550 °C. However, different peak areas hint on a different degree of crystallization. Conformingly, the sintering behavior, measured in terms of area shrinkage, significantly differed for the silver-pastes under study. For silver-pastes with NZB or LZB-glass, sintering starts at 464 °C for NZB Ag pastes and at 451 °C for LZB Ag pastes and ends at 597 °C for NZB Ag paste and at 594 °C for LZB Ag paste. The sintering of the RZB Ag paste proceeds between 426 °C and 703 °C. The final densification was retarded possibly due to crystallization or swelling. The low sinter onset at 426 °C seems to correlate with the good wetting behavior of the RZB glass. Thus, the lowest apparent contact angle between the just densified powder compact sintered at a silver substrate was found for this glass. Moreover, microstructure analyses of the various composites indicate differences in silver dissolution and reprecipitation. T2 - Technology Crossover Extravaganza, HiTEC/CICMT/APEPS CY - Online meeting DA - 26.04.2021 KW - Silver-glass-metallization-paste KW - Sintering KW - Crystallization KW - Alkali ions KW - Sintering atmosphere PY - 2021 AN - OPUS4-52872 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Heuser, Lina A1 - Sobek, P. A1 - Müller, Ralf A1 - Körner, S. T1 - Sintering of silver-glass composites N2 - High conductive silver metallization pastes are key components in advanced electronics and photovoltaics. Increasing demands on efficiency, miniaturization and ever shorter time-to-market require tailored glass-silver-pastes. In these pastes, low-melting glasses act as a sintering aid achieving better sintering, adhesion and contact formation for solar cells. Yet, the related liquid phase sintering of silver-glass-composites and the underlying mechanism of silver dissolution, transport and reprecipitation are rarely investigated. In this study, systematically varied low melting alkaline zinc borate, alkaline earth borate, and Pb- and Bi-glasses are investigated. Glass transition and crystallization are studied with dilatometry, DTA and XRD. Sintering of the pure glasses, pure silver and silver-glass-composites is analyzed with Hot Stage Microscopy, optical and electron microscopy. Since oxygen dissolved in silver powders can affect the silver dissolution as silver oxide in the matrix oxide glasses, the O2-content of silver powders is determined by Vacuum Hot Extraction. The glass transition temperature of the glasses under study varies between 370 °C and 590 °C whereas the sinter onset largely ranges between 400 °C and 600 °C. On the other hand, it scattered between 200 °C and 450 °C for selected commercial Ag-powders of different particle size and morphology. T2 - 93rd Annual Meeting of DGG in Conjunction with the Annual Meeting of  USTV CY - Nuremberg, Germany DA - 13.05.2019 KW - Silver glass paste KW - Sintering KW - Microstructure PY - 2019 AN - OPUS4-48906 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Heuser, Lina A1 - Sobek, P. A1 - Körner, S. A1 - Müller, Ralf T1 - Sintering of silver-alkali zinc borate glass composites N2 - High conductive silver-glass-metallization-pastes are key components in photovoltaics and advanced microelectronics. However, the underlying mechanisms of liquid phase sintering as silver dissolution, diffusion and reprecipitation are poorly understood so far. In the current work, the influence of different network modifier in alkali-zinc-borate paste-glasses on liquid phase sintering of silver-glass-composites was studied. Therefore, silver-glass-composites containing 30 vol% glass were prepared, using low melting X2O-ZnO-B2O3 glasses with X = Na, Li, and Rb (NZB, LZB, and RZB). Glass transition temperature, viscosity, glass-silver wetting, crystallization and sintering behavior was studied by means of thermal analysis, dilatometry, heating microscopy and microscopy. Similar glass transition temperatures of 450 °C (RZB), 460 °C (LZB) and 465 °C (NZB) were found by means of thermal analysis for glasses under study. Also, all glasses have a similar crystallization onset at about 550 °C, even though exhibiting with a different degree of crystallization. Despite these similarities, however, the sintering behavior, measured in terms of area shrinkage, significantly differs for the composites. This finding indicates a different degree of silver dissolution. Assuming that dissolved silver reduces the viscosity, this effect could explain why glass crystallization starts at lower temperature in the composites. For example, the crystallization peak of LZB at 629 °C measured for pure glass powder compacts was decreased to 586 °C for the composite. Confirmatively, microstructure analyses indicate different degrees of silver dissolution, as e.g. revealed by different amount of silver precipitates within the residual glass phase, and reprecipitation. Best silver dissolution appeared for the RZB glass. Nevertheless, the final densification of RZB was retarded probably due to swelling and crystallization. T2 - XRM Workshop CY - Halle, Germany DA - 03.03.2020 KW - Silver-glass-metallization-paste KW - Sintering KW - Alkali ions PY - 2020 AN - OPUS4-51243 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Reinsch, Stefan A1 - Müller, Ralf A1 - Agea-Blanco, Boris A1 - Blaeß, Carsten A1 - Waurischk, Tina T1 - Sintering and foaming of silicate glass powders N2 - Glass powders are promising candidates for manufacturing a broad diversity of sintered materials like sintered glass-ceramics, glass matrix composites, glass bonded ceramics or pastes. Powder processing, however, can substantially affect sinterability, e.g. by promoting surface crystallization. On the other hand, densification can be hindered by gas bubble formation for slow crystallizing glass powders. Against this background, we studied sintering and foaming of silicate glass powders with different crystallization tendency for wet milling and dry milling in air, Ar, N2, and CO2 by means of heating microscopy, DTA, Vacuum Hot Extraction (VHE), SEM, IR spectroscopy, XPS, and ToF-SIMS. In any case, foaming activity increased significantly with progressive milling. For moderately milled glass powders, subsequent storage in air could also promote foaming. Contrarily, foaming could be substantially reduced by milling in water and 10 wt% HCl. Although all powder compacts were uniaxially pressed and sintered in air, foaming was significantly affected by different milling atmosphere and was found most pronounced for milling in CO2 atmosphere. Conformingly, VHE studies revealed that foaming is mainly driven by carbonaceous species, even for powders milled in other gases. Current results of this study thus indicate that foaming is caused by carbonaceous species trapped on the glass powder surface. T2 - IMAPS/ACerS 15th International Conference and Exhibition on Ceramic Interconnect and Ceramic Microsystems Technologies (CICMT 2019) CY - Shanghai, China DA - 16.04.2019 KW - Glass powder KW - Sintering KW - Foaming PY - 2019 AN - OPUS4-48196 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Müller, Ralf A1 - Agea Blanco, Boris A1 - Blaeß, Carsten A1 - Waurischk, Tina A1 - Reinsch, Stefan A1 - Behrens, H. T1 - Sintering and foaming of silicate N2 - Glass powders are promising candidates for manufacturing a broad diversity of sintered materials like sintered glass-ceramics, glass matrix composites or glass bonded ceramics with properties and complex shape. Powder processing, however, can substantially affect sinterability, e.g. by promoting surface crystallization. On the other hand, densification can be hindered by gas bubble formation for slow crystallizing glass powders. Against this background, we studied sintering and foaming of silicate glass powders with different crystallization tendency for wet milling and dry milling in air, Ar, N2, and CO2 by means of heating microscopy, DTA, Vacuum Hot Extraction (VHE), SEM, IR spectroscopy, XPS, and ToF-SIMS. In any case, foaming activity increased significantly with progressive milling. For moderately milled glass powders, subsequent storage in air could also promote foaming. Contrarily, foaming could be substantially reduced by milling in water and 10 wt% HCl. Although all powder compacts were uniaxially pressed and sintered in air, foaming was significantly affected by different milling atmosphere and was found most pronounced for milling in CO2 atmosphere. Conformingly, VHE studies revealed that foaming is mainly driven by carbonaceous species, even for powders milled in other gases. Current results of this study thus indicate that foaming is caused by carbonaceous species trapped on the glass powder surface. T2 - ICG Annual Meeting 2018 CY - Yokohama, Japan DA - 23.09.2018 KW - Foaming KW - Glass KW - Powder KW - Sintering PY - 2018 AN - OPUS4-46474 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Müller, Ralf A1 - Agea-Blanco, Boris A1 - Blaeß, Carsten A1 - Reinsch, Stefan A1 - Behrens, H T1 - Sintering and Foaming of Silicate Glass Powders N2 - The lecture focuses on the mechanisms of non-desired gas bubble formation and foaming during the sintering of glass powder compacts. It is shown that foaming is driven by carbon gases and that carbonates, encapsulated in micropores or mechaniacally dissolved beneath the glass surface, provide the major foaming source. T2 - Sandanski Workshop Sinter crystallization 27th-29th September 2021 PROJECT “THEORY AND APPLICATIONS OF SINTER-CYSTALLIZATION” DN 19/7 CY - Online meeting DA - 27.10. 2021 KW - Sintering KW - Non-desired foaming PY - 2021 AN - OPUS4-53772 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Blaeß, Carsten A1 - Müller, Ralf A1 - Feldmann, Ines A1 - Brauer, D.S. T1 - Sintering ability of fluoride-containing bioactive glass powder N2 - Sintered bioactive glass scaffolds of defined shape and porosity, e.g. made via additive manufacturing, must provide sufficient bioactivity and sinterability. As higher bioactivity is often linked to high corrosion and crystallization tendency, a certain compromise between sintering ability and bioactivity is therefore required. Groh et al. developed a fluoride-containing bioactive glass (F3), which allows fiber drawing and shows a bioactivity well comparable to that of Bioglass®45S5. To study whether and to what extent the sinterability of F3 glass powder is controlled by particle size, coarse and fine F3 glass powders (300-310µm and 0-32µm) were prepared by crushing, sieving and milling. Sintering, degassing and phase transformation during heating were studied with heating microscopy, vacuum hot extraction (VHE), DTA, XRD, and SEM. For the coarse glass powder, sintering proceeds slowly and is limited by surface crystallization of primary Na2CaSi2O6 crystals. Although the crystallization onset of Na2CaSi2O6 is shifted to lower temperature, full densification is attained for the fine powder. This finding indicate that certain porosity might be tuned via particle size variation. Above 900°C, intensive foaming is evident for the fine powder. VHE studies revealed that carbon species are the main foaming source. T2 - 92. Glastechnische Tagung CY - Bayreuth, Germany DA - 28.05.2018 KW - Sintering KW - Bioactive glass KW - Crystallization PY - 2018 AN - OPUS4-45568 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Heuser, Lina A1 - Sobek, P. A1 - Körner, S. A1 - Müller, Ralf T1 - Silver - alkali borate glass pastes N2 - Network modifier ions can decisively influence properties and structure of low melting alkali-zinc-borate glasses and thus cause complex effects on the liquid phase sintering of silver-glass metallization pastes. This effect was studied for X2O-ZnO-B2O3 (X = Li, Na, Rb) glasses for silver-glass metallization pastes. Viscosity and the glass transition temperature, Tg, were measured with rotational viscometry and dilatometry. Dried model pastes with 30 vol% LZB, NZB or RZB glass were prepared for sintering studies by means of heating microscopy measuring the silhouette area shrinkage of uniaxially pressed powder compacts during heating at 5 K/min. For comparison, the silhouette area shrinkage of pure glass and silver powder compacts were determined. Glass-silver wetting was investigated during heating of bulk glass cylinders placed on silver substrates. Glass RZB turned out to have the lowest viscosity among the glasses under study. Its glass transformation temperature, Tg, was found at 444 °C and it caused the lowest sintering onset for its glass and paste powder compacts. Slightly increased values of Tg were found for NZB and LZB (468 °C and 466 °C, respectively) and a slightly retarded sintering was found for both paste powder compacts. These results indicate that liquid phase sintering of silver-glass pastes under air atmosphere is mainly influenced by glass viscosity. T2 - GLASS MEETING 2020 CY - Online meeting DA - 07.12.2020 KW - Silver-glass metallization paste KW - Sintering KW - Alkali ions KW - Viscosity KW - Silver precipitates PY - 2020 AN - OPUS4-52871 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Heuser, Lina A1 - Müller, Ralf A1 - Nofz, Marianne A1 - Deubener, J. T1 - Liquid phase sintering of alkali zinc borate glass-bearing silver pastes for applications in photovoltaics and microelectronics N2 - Liquid phase sintering of glass bearing silver pastes used in photovoltaics and microelectronics is poorly understood. In particular, the role of different network modifiers acting in the glass component and the question of the most suitable atmospheric oxygen level during sintering are still under considerable debate. To tackle these issues, low-melting and lead-free X2O-ZnO-B2O3 glasses with X = Li, Na, K and Rb (LZB, NZB, KZB and RZB) were prepared. Infrared spectroscopy showed that the glass structure was similar to each other, while an increase of tetrahedrally coordinated boron with increasing field strength of the alkali was evident. In turn, the glass transition temperature (from differential thermal analysis) increased in the order: RZB (449 °C) < KZB (460 °C) < NZB (465 °C) < LZB (472 °C). Powders of each glass were mixed with organics to receive silver-glass-pastes containing 30 vol% glass and these were subjected to heating microscopy in air. Although similar onset temperatures of sintering were recorded for Ag-NZB and Ag-LZB glass pastes, and for Ag-RZB paste and KZB-Ag-paste, respectively, differences in the crystallization behavior and final densification were observed between the former and the latter group. These were translated in terms of differences in silver dissolution and reprecipitation among the two groups. Further, running the experiments in nitrogen gas showed that sintering of all pastes was considerably hampered. The slow-down of the sinter kinetics was found to be in line with the assumed lower oxidation and dissolution of silver ions into the glass-forming liquid. T2 - 26th International Congress on Glass CY - Berlin, Germany DA - 03.07.2022 KW - Silver metallization paste KW - Sintering KW - Glass KW - Alkali zinc borate glasses KW - Viscosity KW - Structure PY - 2022 AN - OPUS4-55728 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Müller, Ralf T1 - Glass Sintering with Concurrent Crystallization and Foaming N2 - Glass powders are promising candidates for manufacturing a broad diversity of sintered materials like sintered glass-ceramics, glass matrix composites or glass bonded ceramics with tailored mechanical, thermal, electrical and optical properties and complex shape. Its wide and precise adjustability makes this class of materials a key component for advanced technologies. Processing of glass or composite powders often allow even more flexibility in materials design. At the same time, however, processing can have substantial effects on the glass powder surface and sinterability. Thus, mechanical damage and surface contamination can strongly enhance surface crystallization, which may retard or even fully prevent densification. Whereas sintering and concurrent crystallization have been widely studied, partially as cooperative effort of the TC7 of the ICG, and although glass powder sintering is predominantly applied for glasses of low crystallization tendency, sintering is also limited by gas bubble formation or foaming. The latter phenomenon is much less understood and can occur even for slow crystallizing glass powders. The lecture illustrates possible consequences of glass powder processing on glass sintering, crystallization and foaming. T2 - 7th Int Congress on Ceramics, Symposium Frontiers of Glass Science CY - Iguacu, Brazil DA - 17.06.2018 KW - Glass KW - Powder KW - Sintering KW - Foaming PY - 2018 AN - OPUS4-45670 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -