Sintered glass and glass-ceramic structures and methods for producing

A unitary structure (10) is comprised of two or more planar substrates (30, 40) fused together by a glass or glass-ceramic sintered patterned frit material (20) disposed therebetween. The pattern of the sintered patterned frit material defines passages (70) therein, and the sintered patterned frit material (20) has a characteristic minimum feature size (60) in a direction parallel to the substrates. Particles of the frit material have a poly-dispersed size distribution up to a maximum frit particle size, in a maximum length dimension, and the minimum feature size (60) of the sintered patterned frit material is greater than 2 times the maximum frit particle size, desirably about 3 times or more, and less than 6.25 times the maximum frit particle size, desirably about 5 times or less, most desirably about 4 times or less. A method for making the structure (10) is also disclosed.