Purification of Silver Nanowires Synthesised by Polyol Method

Abstract

The mesh-based silver nanowires (Ag NWs) films are considered to be a good alternative to high-cost, brittle ITO as a transparent conductive electrode (TCE) for the sustainable flexible electronic devices. The polyol synthesis method is the common method to synthesis Ag NWs wherein Ag particles are also produced as a by-product. The present work used decantation combined with solvent-aid precipitation approach to remove silver particles from the Ag NWs suspension to produce quality Ag NWs based TCE. The synthesised and purified products were characterized by using Scanning electron microscopy, UV-Visible spectroscopy and X-ray diffractometry. This method proved to be a simpler and more effective one compared to filtration and centrifugation method as it yields more NWs against the particles. © 2018 Elsevier Ltd.