Abstract
Surface encapsulation of metal nanoparticles (NPs) is fundamental to achieve sufficient dispersion stability of metal nanocolloids, or metal nanoink. However, the feature is incompatible with surface reactive nature of the metal NPs, although these features are both essential to realizing the functional applications into printed electronics technologies. Here we show that two different kinds of encapsulation for silver NPs (AgNPs) by alkylamine and alkylacid together are the key to achieve unique compatibility between the high dispersion stability as dense nanoclolloids and the AgNP chemisorption printing on activated patterned polymer surfaces. Advanced confocal dynamic light scattering study reveals that an additive trace amount of oleic acid is the critical parameter for controlling the dispersion and coagulative (or surface-reactive) characteristics of the silver nanocolloids. The composition of the disperse media is also important for obtaining highly concentrated but low-viscosity silver nanocolloids that show very stable dispersion. The results demonstrate that the high-resolution AgNP chemisorption printing is possible only by using unique silver nanocolloids composed of an exceptional balance of ligand formulation and dispersant composition.
Highlights
Metal nanocolloids (NCs) attract considerable attentions recently as “functional inks” to manufacture fine metal wiring patterns by using printing-based device production technologies[1,2,3,4]
A simple question arises regarding the mechanism of the above-mentioned AgNP-chemisorption printing technique, or more intuitively associated with the surface reactivity of suspended AgNPs: Why could the high dispersion stability of the AgNPs be maintained as AgNCs for such a long period of time as long as a few months[12,15,16], whereas a high reactivity is possible for exclusive and rapid AgNP chemisorption only on the patterned activated surfaces?
We present the dispersion characteristics of the AgNCs as investigated through the use of advanced dynamic light scattering (DLS) technique[17] to clarify the origin of the unique compatibility of the dispersion stability and the AgNP-chemisorption printing technique
Summary
Metal nanocolloids (NCs) attract considerable attentions recently as “functional inks” to manufacture fine metal wiring patterns by using printing-based device production technologies[1,2,3,4]. A class of silver NCs (AgNCs), obtained by thermal decomposition of oxalate-bridging silver alkylamine complexes, is shown to exhibit both highly stable dispersion as AgNCs and particular self-sintering characteristics after drying of the AgNCs8 These AgNCs are composed of silver NPs (AgNPs) (with an average diameter of about 13 nm) encapsulated by alkylamines and a slight amount of oleic acid, and can be suspended at a very high concentration of 40 wt% in a 4:1 (volume ratio) mixed dispersant of n-octane and n-butanol. On the basis of the obtained results, we demonstrate that these AgNCs are composed of a unique balance of ligand formulation and dispersant composition, which has been unexplored but should take crucial roles in the high-resolution AgNP-chemisorption printing technique
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