Ecofriendly Printing of Silver Nanowires with Cellulose Binder for Highly Robust Flexible Electronics

Scalable manufacturing of soft electronics with high performance and reliability represents one of the most demanding challenges for the application of soft electronics. Herein, an ecofriendly silver nanowire (AgNW) based ink with cellulose as the binder is reported. The ink properties, annealing condition, and electromechanical properties of the printed electronics are investigated. With a proper annealing process, the hot-melt binder under high temperatures provides excellent adhesion between the NWs and the substrate, leading to robust electrical performance of the printed AgNWs under mechanical deformation, tape peeling, scratching, and chemical corrosion. The printed AgNWs are demonstrated as flexible temperature sensors due to their temperature-dependent resistance behavior. The temperature sensors are used to sense touching, respiration, and body temperature. The mechanical robustness and chemical stability of the printed AgNW electronics, without the need of an encapsulation layer, makes them ideal for skin-mounted electronics applications.