silver nanowires tagged posts

Over the past decades, electronics engineers have created devices of various shapes and with increasingly sophisticated designs. This includes electronics that can be folded onto themselves, such as foldable phones, along with various other compressible devices.

Researchers at Ajou University and other institutes in South Korea recently introduced a new design for developing crumple-recoverable electronics, or in other words, electronics that can recover their original shape after being crumpled or compressed onto themselves to reduce their size...

Duke University chemists have found that silver nanowire films like these conduct electricity well enough to form functioning circuits without applying high temperatures, enabling printable electronics on heat-sensitive materials like paper or plastic. Credit: Ian Stewart and Benjamin Wiley

By suspending tiny metal nanoparticles in liquids, Duke University scientists are brewing up conductive ink-jet printer “inks” to print inexpensive, customizable circuit patterns on just about any surface...

Left, photograph of a large-scale silver nanowire-coated flexible film. Right, silver nanowire particles viewed under the microscope. Credit: S.K. Yoon, Korea University

A new, ultrathin film that is both transparent and highly conductive to electric current has been produced by a cheap and simple method devised by an international team of nanomaterials researchers from University of Illinois at Chicago and Korea University. The film is also bendable and stretchable, offering potential applications in roll-up touchscreen displays, wearable electronics, flexible solar cells and electronic skin.

The new film is made of fused silver nanowires, and is produced by spraying the nanowire particles through a tiny jet nozzle at supersonic speed...

(a) Schematic cross-sectional diagram of the device. In the absence of an electric field, the surfaces are relatively smooth, and light passes through without being scattered or refracted. (b) When connected to a high-voltage source, the nanowires locally compress the elastomer, deforming its surface. Since the nanowires are randomly oriented, the resulting deformation diffuses light passing through the device. (c–f) Changes of opacity at the indicated actuation voltage from 0 to 2.2 kV, demonstrating control over the in-line transmittance using electrical potential. The logo and text are located 15 cm behind the circular film. The black rectangles are electrical contacts to the two sides of nanowire electrodes.

Method turns glass from clear to opaque with the flick of a switch...