Large-scale synthesis and characterization of very long silver nanowires via successive multistep growth

Abstract

In this research, we developed a novel successive multistep growth method to synthesize very long silver nanowires (AgNWs) over several hundred micrometers (maximum length of 400-500 mu m) and performed a systematic parameter study to optimize the dimension of nanowires synthesized at a large scale. It was demonstrated that AgNWs continued to grow through successive multistep growth as long as Ag ion rich conditions were maintained continuously. We successfully attained an extremely high aspect ratio of 1000-3000 with length of over 300 mu m and diameter of less than 150 nm. This value demonstrated an order of magnitude length enhancement from previous AgNW synthesis research. Furthermore, we demonstrated that the very long AgNW mesh can be used for a transparent conductor as an alternative to metal oxide conductors. The production of very long metal nanowires at a large scale has significant impact on their potential application in flexible transparent conductors.