(Invited) Flexible Transparent Conductors Based on Metallic Nanomesh

Abstract

Materials are often optically transparent but not electrically conducting like glass, or conducting but not transparent like metals, or transparent and conducting like indium-doped tin oxide (ITO) but not flexible. Flexible transparent conductors are required for many potential applications like foldable displays, impact resistant screens, etc., which demands transparent conductors very flexible. Nanowires such as silver, carbon nanotubes, etc., has been laid on flexible transparent polymers to achieve high electrical conductivity, but the contact resistance between the wires prevent the conductivity from being high enough. At the same time, graphene has also been studied as flexible transparent conductors without great success due to the large decrease of transparency when high enough conductivity is needed. We discovered metallic nanomesh network exhibiting super flexibility, transparency, and conductivity by grain boundary masking and depsoition. These conductors exhibit sheet resistance lower than 10 ohms per square, transparency above 85%, stretchability more than 300%, bendability to a radius less than 1 mm, and can be repeatedly stretched for more than 100,000 times without fatigue. Further more, these materials are also very resistant to scratches.