Abstract
Thin and long silver nanowires were successfully synthesized using the polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP)-assisted polyol method in the presence of ionic liquids, tetrapropylammonium chloride and tetrapropylammonium bromide, which served as soft template salts. The first step involved the formation of Ag nanoparticles with a diameter of 40 to 50 nm through the reduction of silver nitrate. At the growing stage, the Ag nanoparticles were converted into thin and long one-dimensional wires, with uniform diameters of 30 ± 3 nm and lengths of up to 50 μm. These Ag nanowires showed an electrical conductivity of 0.3 × 105 S/cm, while the sheet resistance of a two-dimensional percolating Ag nanowire network exhibited a value of 20 Ω/sq with an optical transmittance of 93% and a low haze value.
Highlights
One-dimensional (1-D) metallic nanostructures, namely silver nanowires (Ag NWs), have recently attracted a great deal of attention for their unique electrical, optical, magnetic, and thermal properties as a promising alternative to indium tin oxide (ITO) as an electrode material used in the fabrication of devices such as electronic displays, photonics, and sensors [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]
We demonstrate a new approach based on the PVP-assisted polyol method for the preparation of Ag NWs with a thin diameter (30 nm) and long length (40 to 60 μm) using ionic liquids (ILs), a mixture of tetrapropylammonium chloride (TPA-C) and tetrapropylammonium bromide (TPA-B), as soft template salts
We examined that specific self-assembled local structures, and pores, may exist in an ammonium-based IL, demonstrating that ammonium IL can be effectively used as a soft template material capable of promoting the growth of Ag NWs
Summary
One-dimensional (1-D) metallic nanostructures, namely silver nanowires (Ag NWs), have recently attracted a great deal of attention for their unique electrical, optical, magnetic, and thermal properties as a promising alternative to indium tin oxide (ITO) as an electrode material used in the fabrication of devices such as electronic displays, photonics, and sensors [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]. The structure of the ILs associated with specific anions is known to self-organize in such a way that it is compliant to the fabrication of metal nanostructures [21] In this regard, recently, Suh et al [22] demonstrated that imidazolium salts as a kind of IL can be used as a reaction mediator capable of promoting the growth of Ag NWs, the length of wires is short. We examined that specific self-assembled local structures, and pores, may exist in an ammonium-based IL, demonstrating that ammonium IL can be effectively used as a soft template material capable of promoting the growth of Ag NWs. The IL-assisted formation of Ag NWs was performed, in which a metal precursor (AgNO3) was converted to elemental metal by ethylene glycol (EG) in the presence of ammonium ILs. The IL (which was composed of TPA-C and TPA-B) was evaluated as a soft template in order to control the Ag nanostructures. This approach produces Ag NWs in high yields, making it very useful for the large-scale production of long and thin but uniform Ag NWs
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