Folding-insensitive, flexible transparent conductive electrodes based on copper nanowires

Abstract

Flexible transparent conductive electrodes (FTCEs) have received a great deal of attention for various applications due to their versatile ability. To demonstrate high-performance of FTCEs, numerous efforts have been focused on high conductivity, transparency and mechanical durability against bending. However, it is still a challenge for FTCEs to apply in foldable applications due to the degradation of electrical conductivity during folding. In this paper, high-performance FTCEs with folding-insensitivity are achieved by embedding copper nanowires (Cu NWs) into polymethyl methacrylate strategy via simple sol-gel transition. The prepared film demonstrates a very high transmittance of ~94 % with a low sheet resistance of 56.3 Ω/sq. In particular, excellent insensitivity conductivity are achieved with a bending radius of 2.5 μm and the resistance remains nearly to be constant after 1000 folding cycles with a bending radius of 50 μm. Moreover, the film shows a good stability to resist long-term storage and ultrasonication. Finally, flexible transparent heater is fabricated based on the FTCEs, the immediate response make it have a great promise to be used as defrost, antifog and (light emitting diode) LED devices. • Folding-insensitive FTCEs are prepared by sol-gel technology. • The conductivity enable to achieve excellent insensitivity to the folding. • The FTCE shows a good stability to resist long-term storage and ultrasonication. • The FTCE has very high transmittance of ~94 % with sheet resistance of 56.3 Ω/sq.