Preparation and properties of electrically conductive, flexible and transparent silver nanowire/poly (lactic acid) nanocomposites

As the everyday use of petroleum-based products has raised environmental concerns, there is an urgent need to replace them with green materials. In this work, an eco-friendly, highly conductive, flexible silver nanowire/poly (lactic acid) film has been fabricated through a simple casting method by embedding the silver nanowires (AgNWs) below the surface of the poly lactic acid (PLA) matrix. The fabricated film has a high optical transparency of 89.5% with a sheet resistance of 64.8 ohm/square and a figure of merit (FoM) of 4.92 x 10(-3) Omega(-1) which is comparable to that of indium tin oxide (ITO). These films demonstrate excellent flexibility, great adhesion, smooth surface with root mean square (RMS) roughness of 11.7 nm and high mechanical properties with tensile strength and Young's modulus of 39.8 (MPa) and 1.6 (GPa). The results obtained from different testing methods show that the AgNW/PLA nanocomposites are potential candidates in flexible electronics and optoelectronics. (C) 2017 Elsevier B. V.