Capacitor discharge sintering with silver-nickel nano-composite in the interconnection of thermoelectric generators

This paper presents a capacitor discharge sintering process with a homemade silver-nickel paste for thermoelectric element interconnections. The paste is a 75 nm silver/nickel composite mixture. Without using any specific atmosphere control, the capacitor discharge is capable of nanoparticle sintering with time-efficient process at room temperature. A 0.01 F capacitor is serially connected to the sample and charged to 10 V (0.5 Joule) for the sintering process. To evaluate the conductivity of the sintered composite, the conductive material is screen-printed on an Al2O3 ceramic substrate; it forms a rectangular tunnel to bridge two silver electrodes. After sintering process, the resistance of the screened conductive pass-way is dropped from 9.47 Ω to 0.35 Ω. The bonding strength and high temperature resistance test results of the sintered composite is also presented in this paper. Without generating a lot of heat, the sintering process can be applicable to flexible electronics.