With the continuous development of technology, various transparent and flexible electronic devices have developed rapidly. However, compared with transparent flexible conductive materials, there are still many problems in the research of transparent flexible circuits. The research of many transparent flexible circuits only stays at the level of transparent substrate and opaque circuit. Recently, Professor Sun Jing of Dalian University has designed a transparent flexible circuit by using polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) as a flexible substrate and silver nanowires (AgNWs) as a conductive material, which overcomes the previous transparent flexible circuit part. The drawback of transparency is the realization of a truly transparent transparent circuit. The related research work was published in Chemical Communications and was selected as the bottom article of the 5418, Volume 39, issue of 2018.
The researchers first performed experiments on PDMS, using the spin coating technique to spread the AgNWs solution evenly on the hydrophilically modified PDMS surface. The transmittance and resistance of the transparent flexible conductive material reached 90.86% and 3.22 Ω·sq-1, respectively. It is at the leading level in the field of transparent flexible conductive materials.
The research team used the mature microfluidic control technology to create holes with various complex patterns on the transparent flexible substrate PDMS surface, and the precision can reach micron level; then AgNWs are spread into these holes to make them high at the same time. Electrical conductivity. The transparent flexible circuit thus prepared has a strong wear resistance due to the protection of the channel to the AgNWs.
The transparent flexible circuit not only has good optical and electrical properties, but also has good mechanical properties. They used LEDs and ordinary dry batteries to test their electrical conductivity. The results showed that the conductivity was good. After the 180-degree inward and outward bending, 720-degree distortion and tensile test of the circuit, the brightness of the LEDs remained basically unchanged. change. The researchers further explored the application of the transparent flexible circuit, deposited Pd nanoparticles on the AgNWs of the circuit by electrodeposition, and used it to detect glucose. The results show that the sensor has high sensitivity to glucose detection.
The originality of this research is to solve two problems in the preparation of transparent flexible circuits: (1) to achieve a completely transparent flexible circuit; (2) to design circuit patterns as desired. The transparent flexible electrode prepared by the research is simple in preparation, controllable in quality and excellent in technical indicators, which can greatly promote the development of wearable electronic devices.