Al2O3 Coatings Fabrication on Silver Nanowires through Low Temperature Atomic Layer Deposition

Silver nanowires (AgNWs) films were coated conformally with aluminum oxide (Al2O3) through atomic layer deposition (ALD) at very low temperature. The AgNWs films were first fabricated through spin coating on polyamide substrates. Later on Al2O3 coatings were deposited on the spin coated AgNWs films by ALD at a very low deposition temperature of 50 degrees C using trimethylaluminum and distilled water. The optimized ALD cycle involves a very short H2O purging step of only 10 s, which not only removes the residual H2O vapors effectively but also enhances the efficeny of the process by reducing the total time required for completion of Al2O3 deposition. The surface morphology was observed through field-emission scanning electron microscopy and film crystallinity using X-ray diffractometer, respectively. The observed results revealed conformal and amorphous nature of Al2O3 coatings on AgNWs films. The chemical composition and films purity were analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. It has been verified by the results that the ALD technique is well capable of depositing uniform Al2O3 coatings on AgNWs films at very low temperature. The deposited coatings are expected to be of very much interest in flexible electronic applications in near future.