Alignment of Silver Nanowires for Stretchable Electrodes

Transparent conductors (TCs) for the next generation of soft electronic devices need to be highly stretchable, conductive and transparent; while inevitable challenge lies in enhancing them simultaneously. Cost effective silver nanowires (AgNWs) were widely used but the conventional random network gives high junction resistance as well as the degraded conductivity at stretched state. Here a novel, facile and versatile agitation-assisted assembly approach is reported to control the orientation direction and density of AgNWs and to Layer-by-Layer deposit the AgNWs monolayer or multilayers onto the pre-strained soft substrate. Such electrode gives the unprecedented low sheet resistance of 2.8 Ω sq-1 as well as high transparency of 85% and high stretchability of 40%. It is interesting to note that contrary to most other reports, such device shows higher conductivity at the stretched state compared to the released state.