Preparation of conductive ink based on silver nanoparticles

Abstract

Without using complicated devices, silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) were successfully synthesized at high concentrations for the application of inkjet printing conductive ink. The main purpose of this research is to define the effect of two surfactants cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) and chitosan on the formation of AgNPs in the solution. According to transmission electron microscopy (TEM) results, AgNPs prepared by CTAB were well-dispersed with the size under 10 nm, the high density and the nanospheres ratio at 100%. From the x-ray diffraction (XRD) results, synthesized AgNPs were crystalline attributed to the cubic crystal structure of silver. From the UV-visible spectrophotometry (UV–vis) results, plasmon resonance peak of using CTAB was at 400 nm whereas the peak of using chitosan was at 430 nm. AgNPs synthesized by CTAB surfactant were suitable for conductive ink application with the characteristics of the AgNPs as high stability after 6 month preparation, geometrical uniformity shape, under 10 nm size and high density. The conductive inkjet ink properties kept appropriate to printing device after 6 months of preparation.