Resistive behaviour of silver nanoparticle films on ultra-low modulus polydimethylsiloxane with trench type roughness

Abstract

The resistive behaviour of silver (Ag) nanoparticle based thin films at different loading conditions (axial stretching, bending and repeated bending) has been studied on rough ultra-low modulus polydimethylsiloxane substrates with scratch or trench type roughness. These films have been fabricated using a non-vacuum and scalable thin film deposition technique, rod coating. The fabricated films showed minute changes in their resistance when stretched up to an average of almost 27% axial strain, and when bent on circular surfaces with diameters in the range 10–30 mm. The films were also found to remain conductive even after 1000 bending cycles. These results suggest that the as-fabricated silver nanoparticle films could be potentially useful in areas like stretchable, flexible and epidermal electronics.