Zn-Dust Derived Zn/ZnO Cermet Fillers for Thermally Conductive High-k Epoxy Dielectrics

Abstract

The fabrication of Zn/ZnO metal–semiconductor cermet architecture via simple heat treatment of raw Zn dust was investigated at different calcination temperature and time under air atmosphere. Raw Zn dust was calcined in the temperature range 450–600 °C for 1–3 h. The epoxy-cermet composites were fabricated by simple solution casting method. The effect of ceramic to metal ratio of cermet particle on the properties of epoxy composite was analyzed by incorporating cermet particle obtained at different calcination condition in the epoxy matrix. The enhancement in dielectric properties of epoxy-cermet composites is resulted from the duplex interfacial polarization induced by metal–semiconductor and semiconductor-insulator interfaces of cermet particle. Initially epoxy-cermet composite was fabricated by loading 30 wt% of cermet filler obtained at different calcination conditions. Further the effect of particle loading on properties of epoxy-cermet composite was investigated by varying the loading (10–30 wt%) of cermet particle obtained at 500 °C/3 h. With different filler loading the dielectric constant was varied in the range 16–102 while keeping dielectric loss and conductivity within an acceptable limit. The thermal conductivity of epoxy cermet composite has also enhanced to 1.152 W m−1 K−1 for epoxy loaded with 30 wt% cermet particle (Zn/ZnO @ 500 °C/3 h). The enhancement in the dielectric and thermal properties of epoxy composites were resulted from the interface design of epoxy-cermet composite by adjusting metal to semiconductor ratio of cermet particle. The obtained high-k epoxy-cermet composites can be used for the fabrication of embedded passive components and other related electronic devices.