"Nano Necklace"� Formed by Electroless Deposition of Metal on Polymer Nanofiber for Flexible Transparent Conducting Films

Flexible transparent thin films are strongly required for electronic devices, display or electric equipment.  To obtain both transparency and flexibility, electroless deposition on the polymer nanofiber was carried out. As the result, we successfully obtained uniformly metalized nanofiber with 300nm in diameter by all wet process without using any vacuum process.

 First, we fabricated Nylon 6 nanofiber with nanoweb structure with 50nm in diameter by electrospinning method¹. Then, NiP was metalized by electroless deposition on the nylon 6 nanofiber at the relatively lower temperature of 60 to 65 ^oC for 40 seconds². By the Scanning Electron Microscope observation, it was found that numerous spherical shape of NiP beeds with the diameter of 300nm were tightly connected and arranged on the surface of nylon 6 nanofiber with the diameter of 50nm. It seems that same size of numerous metal beeds were formed just like “Nano Necklace” surrounding the nylon 6 nanofiber.

  The electrical characteristics and the mechanical characteristics were evaluated and the possibility of the future application for the flexible transparent conductive electrodes were suggested.

References:

1)Ding, B., Li, C., Miyauchi, Y., Kuwaki, O., Shiratori, S. Nanotechnology, 2006, 17, 3685-3691.

2)Magagnin, L; Sirtori, V; Seregni, S; et al, Electrochimica Acta, 2005,50,23,4621-4625.

Fig.  “Nano Necklace” formed by Electroless Deposition of NiP on the surface of Nylon 6 nanofiber