Fabrication of electrically anisotropic agarose gels by dielectrophoretic assembly and encapsulation of silver nanowires

A novel method for the fabrication of electrically anisotropic agarose gel has been developed by dielectrophoretic assembly and aligning of silver nanowires into bundles of microwires in a gel solution above the gelling point, and cooling to give a composite material with uniform alignment of the nanowires. The electrical anisotropy and stability of the composite agarose-nanowire gel has been characterised.