Flexible Touch Panel Metal Mesh Bending Area Design
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Solution Overview
Problem
Flexible touch panels using transparent conductive metal oxide materials face performance and yield issues due to brittleness under bending stress, leading to reduced flexural endurance and reliability.
Innovation Solution
A touch panel design incorporating a metal mesh pattern in the bending area, where the metal mesh lines are connected in parallel with touch electrodes, enhancing bending resistance, noise shielding, and signal sensitivity, and formed using a flexible substrate with insulating layers and conductive materials like silver palladium copper alloy.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If transparent conductive metal oxide materials are used for touch electrodes, then transparency and conductivity are improved, but brittleness increases and flexural endurance deteriorates under bending stress
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses a composite structure combining transparent conductive metal oxide layers (ITO, IZO, or AZO) with a metal mesh pattern (silver, aluminum, or copper) to create a hybrid electrode system. This composite approach allows the transparent conductive material to provide transparency and conductivity while the metal mesh provides mechanical flexibility and bending resistance, resolving the contradiction between transparency/conductivity and flexural endurance.
Solution Approach 2:
The metal mesh pattern is selectively applied only in the bending area of the touch panel, while the non-bending area uses conventional transparent conductive electrodes. This localized application allows the bending region to have enhanced flexibility and crack resistance through the metal mesh, while maintaining the optical transparency and touch sensitivity of the conventional electrodes in the non-bending region.
2Reliability
If metal mesh pattern is added to enhance bending resistance, then flexural endurance is improved, but device complexity and manufacturing difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The metal mesh pattern is integrated with the existing transparent conductive electrode layers to form a unified electrode system. The metal mesh serves multiple functions simultaneously: providing mechanical reinforcement for bending resistance, maintaining electrical conductivity, and preserving optical transparency. This merging of functions reduces the need for separate components and simplifies the overall structure despite the added functionality.
3Reliability
If metal mesh pattern is used in bending area, then flexural endurance and signal interference resistance are improved, but manufacturing precision requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an insulating layer as an intermediary between the metal mesh pattern and the transparent conductive electrode layers. This insulating layer serves as a mediator that electrically isolates the metal mesh from the transparent conductive electrodes, preventing short circuits and signal interference, while still allowing the metal mesh to provide mechanical reinforcement and conductivity enhancement without requiring extremely tight alignment tolerances.
Data Source
AI summary
A touch panel and a method of manufacturing the same, an electronic device are provided. The touch panel includes a bending area bent along a bending axis. It further includes: a plurality of first touch electrodes extending along a first direction; a plurality of second touch electrodes extending along a second direction; and a metal mesh pattern at least provided in the bending area. The metal mesh pattern includes a first metal mesh line extending along the first direction and connected with the first touch electrode in parallel. The second direction intersects with the first direction.