Mechanically Stable and Damage Resistant Freestanding Ultrathin Silver Nanowire Films with Closely Packed Crossed-Lamellar Structure

Si-Chao Zhang; Huai-Ling Gao; Long Zhang; Yin-Bo Zhu; Ya-Dong Wu; Jian-Wei Liu; Li-Bo Mao; Mei Feng; Liang Dong; Zhao Pan; Xiang-Sen Meng; Yang Lu; Shu-Hong Yu

doi:10.1021/prechem.4c00053

Mechanically Stable and Damage Resistant Freestanding Ultrathin Silver Nanowire Films with Closely Packed Crossed-Lamellar Structure

Precis Chem. 2024 Oct 13;2(12):634-643. doi: 10.1021/prechem.4c00053. eCollection 2024 Dec 23.

Authors

Si-Chao Zhang¹, Huai-Ling Gao^{1

2}, Long Zhang¹, Yin-Bo Zhu², Ya-Dong Wu³, Jian-Wei Liu¹, Li-Bo Mao¹, Mei Feng¹, Liang Dong¹, Zhao Pan¹, Xiang-Sen Meng¹, Yang Lu³, Shu-Hong Yu^{1

4}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemistry, New Cornerstone Science Laboratory, Institute of Biomimetic Materials & Chemistry, Anhui Engineering Laboratory of Biomimetic Materials, Division of Nanomaterials & Chemistry, Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China.
² CAS Key Laboratory of Mechanical Behavior and Design of Materials, Department of Modern Mechanics, CAS Center for Excellence in Complex System Mechanics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China.
³ Anhui Key Laboratory of Controllable Chemical Reaction and Material Chemical Engineering, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei, Anhui 230009, P. R. China.
⁴ Institute of Innovative Materials (I2M), Department of Chemistry, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen 518055, China.

Abstract

One-dimensional (1D) functional nanowires are widely used as nanoscale building blocks for assembling advanced nanodevices due to their unique functionalities. However, previous research has mainly focused on nanowire functionality, while neglecting the structural stability and damage resistance of nanowire assemblies, which are critical for the long-term operation of nanodevices. Biomaterials achieve excellent mechanical stability and damage resistance through sophisticated structural design. Here, we successfully prepared a mechanically stabilized monolamella silver nanowire (Ag NW) film, based on a facile bubble-mediated assembly and nondestructive transfer strategy with the assistance of a porous mixed cellulose ester substrate, inspired by the hierarchical structure of biomaterial. Owing to the closely packed arrangement of Ag NWs combined with their weak interfaces, the monolamellar Ag NW film can be transferred to arbitrary substrates without damage. Furthermore, freestanding multilamellar Ag NW films with impressive damage resistance can be obtained from the monolamellar Ag NW film, through the introduction of bioinspired closely packed crossed-lamellar (CPCL) structure. This CPCL structure maximizes intra- and interlamellar interactions among Ag NWs ensuring efficient stress transfer and uniform electron transport, resulting in excellent mechanical durability and stable electrical properties of the multilamellar Ag NW films.