| Pacific Rim Symposium on Surfaces, Coatings and Interfaces (PacSurf 2016) | |
| Energy Harvesting & Storage | Tuesday Sessions |
| Session EH-TuM |
| Session: | Surfaces & Interfaces for Solar Cells and Solar Fuels |
| Presenter: | Sunghoon Jung, Korea Institute of Materials Science, Republic of Korea |
| Authors: | SH. Jung, Korea Institute of Materials Science, Republic of Korea W. Ahn, Korea Institute of Materials Science, Republic of Korea D,G. Kim, Korea Institute of Materials Science, Republic of Korea |
| Correspondent: | Click to Email |
The random networks of silver nanowires (AgNWs) have been noticed as next generation transparent electrode which satisfies the high conductivity, transmittance and flexibility at the same time. Thus, AgNWs have a great potential for replacement of indium-tin-oxide (ITO) transparent electrode which have been used most widely. Although the nature of the superb self-electrical, optical and mechanical properties, some disadvantages of the transparent electrode such as chemical, environmental stability and contact resistance are bottle-necks for practical applications.
A simple approach to improve the stability of AgNW electrode is to form low-reactive materials such as graphene, graphene oxide and alumina on the top of AgNWs as passivation layers. Chemical and environmental stability is increased and electrical resistance is decreased. However, there are some negative aspects which are losses of transmittance, increasing vertical electrical resistance and upper layer and unisotropic chemical etching.
In this study, plasma techniques are applied to augment the electrical and environmental properties of AgNWs transparent electrode. The electrical resistance is decreased and environmental stability is improved. Moreover, AgNWs with plasma treatment showed much improved thermal stability compared to untreated AgNWs. We applied the plasma treated AgNWs to flexible organic photovoltaic devices as transparent electrode, and its power conversion efficiency is similar to organic photovoltaics based on ITO/Glass.