Roll-to-roll processing

When the rolls of material have been coated, laminated or printed they can be subsequently slit to their finished size on a slitter rewinder.

[citation needed] Some of the devices can be patterned directly, much like an inkjet printer deposits ink.

[4][2] Most notable would be solar cells, which are still prohibitively expensive for most markets due to the high cost per unit area of traditional bulk (mono- or polycrystalline) silicon manufacturing.

A crucial issue for a roll-to-roll thin-film cell production system is the deposition rate of the microcrystalline layer, and this can be tackled using four approaches:[5] Roll-to-roll processing has been used in the manufacture of electrochemical devices such as batteries,[6] supercapacitors,[7] fuel cells,[8][9] and water electrolyzers.

[10] Here, the roll-to-roll processing is utilized for electrode manufacturing and is the key to reducing manufacturing cost[11] through stable production of electrodes on various film substrates such as metal foils, membranes, diffusion media, and separators.