Fabrication of Silver Mesh/Grid and Its Applications in Electronics

Abstract

With the development of flexible electronics, researchers have endeavored to improve the characteristics of the commonly used indium tin oxide such as brittleness, poor mechanical or chemical stability, and scarcity. Currently, many alternative materials have been considered such as conductive polymers, graphene, carbon nanotubes, metallic nanoparticles (NPs), nanowires (NWs), or nanofibers. Among them, silver (Ag) mesh/grid NPs or NWs have been considered as an excellent substitute due to the good transmittance, excellent electrical conductivity, outstanding mechanical robustness, and cost competitiveness. So far, much effort has been devoted to the fabrication of Ag mesh/grid, and many methods such as printing technology, self-assembly, electrospun, hot-pressing, and atomic layer deposition have been reported. Here printing technologies include jet printing, gravure printing, screen printing, nanoimprint lithography, microcontact printing, and flexographic printing. The solution-based self-assembly usually combines with coating, template, or mask assistance. This review summarizes the characteristics of these fabrication methods for the Ag mesh/grid with its related applications in electronics. Then the prospect and challenges of the fabrication methods are discussed, and the new preparation approaches and applications of the Ag mesh/grid are highlighted, which will be of significance for the applications in electronics such as transparent conducting electrodes, organic light-emitting diode, energy harvester, strain sensor, cells, etc.

Optically Transparent and Flexible Radio Frequency Electronics through Printing Technologies

“…It should be noted that metal nanoparticles are not inherently transparent; however, optical transparency will be achieved by creating mesh-based structures. [85][86][87] TCMs can be divided into five sub-group materials, including metal nanowires, conducting oxides, conductive polymers, carbon nanomaterials, and MXenes. Metal nanowires with high electrical conductivity and optical transparency are mainly AgNWs and CuNWs.…”

Preparation and Applications of Electrospun Optically Transparent Fibrous Membrane

“…Self-powered sensors convert wasted micromechanical energy into available electrical energy based on the principles of triboelectricity and piezoelectric [134][135][136]. Optical sensors for chromaticity detection, resistance sensors [137], temperature sensors [98], humidity sensors [138], and pressure sensors, etc. converting external stimuli into electronic signals also had been studied [139].…”

Structural Design and Property Study on Flexible Electronic Films with High Heat Resistance and Friction Durability

“…[11] Compared to other conductive nanomaterials, silver nanowires (AgNWs) are the most promising conductive layers in light of the high conductivity and excellent mechanical flexibility on soft substrates. [12] Despite the advantages of AgNW as a kind of conductive layer candidate, there are a few critical bottlenecks to overcome for large scale application of AgNW films. First, AgNW films cannot perform at high temperature due to the oxidation and corrosion of Ag when temperature up to 200 °C in air at atmosphere pressure.…”

“…The obtained PAEK-dnAg samples in this work (Figure 1) present an embedded structure between dendritic nanosilver and PAEK substrate, which could lead to excellent incorporation between nanoconducting layer (dendritic nanosilver) and polymer substrates (PAEK) as flexible conducive materials. The dendritic nanosilver should exhibit excellent electrical conductivity, [12] and the PAEK (2-ADMPEK) present excellent thermostability (T g of 260 °C). [21] The thermostable PAEK could protect dendritic nanosilver conductive layer from heat or harsh oxidation when the nanosilver is well buried into PAEK substrate.…”