**1. Introduction**

Powder technology has been used as an industrial fabrication technology. For example, a metal powder combine with the binder or solvent, a conductive paste is achieved. Moreover, the conductive paste using the nanometer order metal powder realizes the low temperature fired. On the other hand, not only the metal material but also a ceramic material uses the powder

© 2016 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. © 2018 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

technology. The ceramic material is used for various fields. The most general product is a dinnerware. In addition, examples of being used as vehicle parts have also been reported because it is a high-temperature-tolerant material and it has a chemical resistance [1, 2]. Particularly, the ceramic material is paid attention as electronic components.

patterning process, and printing process for the filling process is combined. The exposed and developed photoresist serves as a mask holding the paste. Moreover, this process is applied for forming the different material pattern. The example of the patterning process of the fine conductive pattern and the different ceramic material are shown with the fabricated pattern.

Powder Process with Photoresist for Ceramic Electronic Components

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In this chapter, the fabrication process for the ceramic electronic components is proposed. The multilayer ceramic technology is usually used for the fabrication process of the ceramic components, but it has some problems. Therefore, the photoresist process is proposed for the production process. The concept, base process and applications of the photoresist process as

**Figure 1.** Schematic illustration of photoresist process (a) patterned ceramic sheet process, (b) patterning process.

**2. Photoresist process**

is following.

In the electronic components field, a miniaturization technology is an important factor. Communication devices such as a PC or smartphone have desired the miniaturization and a high functionalization. To miniaturize a device body, the miniature integrated components and the miniature control circuit are required. By realizing the miniature control system, many components and the large battery can set in the miniature communication devices. Moreover, the miniaturization of the control systems possible a low-loss system because circuits wire that connects to each electronic components become short length.

To achieve the miniature control system, the ceramic material is used for the integrated circuit (IC) packaging [3] and the miniature electronic components. The fine ceramic has some electronic characteristics. Ferrite ceramic shows magnetic characteristic, BaTiO3 is ferroelectric ceramic, and Pb (ZrTi) O3 is used as the piezoelectric ceramic. These ceramic materials support the miniaturization of passive components [4–8].

The conventional fabrication process of the ceramic passive components is the sheet process of the multi-layer ceramic technology [9]. The ceramic components are formed through a firing process. However, the fired ceramic is hard material and it is difficult for any processing. Therefore, it forms the ceramic sheet that is the mixture of the ceramic powder, a binder, and organic solvents, in the first step. The circuit wire patterns are printed on these sheets. After that, the printed sheets are stacked and laminated. In this process, the circuit patterns require a connection between an upper layer and a lower layer. The connection pattern is achieved by forming a through-hole pattern and filling the conductive paste at the printing process. The laminated ceramic sheets are dicing to the designed size, and then, the miniature multi-layer ceramic components are achieved by the firing process. The advantages of this technology are that the three-dimensional (3D) circuit pattern is realized inside the ceramic material, and the electronic characteristics can use for the components.

However, the conventional fabrication process has some problem for further miniaturization. The circuit pattern is formed by a screen printing process in general. This technology shows high productivity, it is suitable for the electronic components. The conductive pattern is made from a conductive paste and it is printed through a mesh pattern. The printed paste requires the leveling time for removing the mesh mark. It is the cause of a deformation of the conductive pattern. In the fine pattern, the adjacent conductors are connected and shorted. And then, to form a fine and high-aspect-ratio pattern is difficult.

Moreover, a high-functional device will be required, and a complex component that has various characteristics will be desired for the miniaturization. To achieve the complex component, the various materials are introduced. However, the conventional research of the different ceramic material pattern is inserting the ceramic sheet [10]. Therefore, it is difficult to form the one point different material pattern.

In this chapter, the photoresist process is proposed. It is possible to form the fine and highaspect-ratio conductive pattern. The proposed process uses a photolithography process for the patterning process, and printing process for the filling process is combined. The exposed and developed photoresist serves as a mask holding the paste. Moreover, this process is applied for forming the different material pattern. The example of the patterning process of the fine conductive pattern and the different ceramic material are shown with the fabricated pattern.
