Wearing eye contact lenses, picture-taking and scanning, is not science fiction anymore.
Ulsan National Institute of Science & Technology (UNIST) has demonstrated that a live rabbit could wear contact lenses fitted with inorganic light-emitting diode with no side effects. This new class of hybrid transparent and stretchable electrode paves the way for flexible displays, solar cells, and electronics.
UNIST scientists have combined graphene with silver nanowires to form a thin, transparent and stretchable electrode which overcome the weaknesses of each individual material, resulting in a new class of electrodes with widespread possible applications including picture taking and scanning using soft contact lenses.
Transparent electrodes have been widely used in things like touch screens, flat-screen TVs, solar cells and light-emitting devices. Commonly made from indium tin oxide(ITO), it is brittle and cracks thus losing functionality if flexed. It also degrades over time, and is expensive due to the limited quantities of indium metal.
As an alternative, the networks of randomly distributed mNWs have been considered as promising candidates for next-generation transparent electrodes, due to their low-cost, high-speed fabrication of transparent electrodes. However, the number of disadvantages of the mNW networks limited their integration into commercial devices. They have low breakdown voltage, typically high NW-NW junction resistance, high contact resistance between network and active materials, material instability and poor adhesion to plastic substrates.
Graphene is also well known as good a candidate for transparent electrode because of their unique electrical properties and high mechanical flexibility. However, scalable graphene synthesis methods for commercialization produces lower quality graphene with individual segments called grains which increases the electrical resistance at boundaries between these grains.
Silver nanowires, on the other hand, have high resistance because they are randomly oriented like a jumble of toothpicks facing in different directions. In this random orientation, there are many contact between nanowires, resulting in high resistance due to large junction resistance of nanowires. Due to these drawbacks, neither is good for conducting electricity, but a hybrid structure, combined from two materials, is.
The hybrid material presents a high electrical and optical performance with mechanical flexibility and stretchability for flexible electronics. The hybrid transparent electrode has a low “sheet resistance” and high transmittance. There’s almost no change in its resistance when bent and folded. Where the ITO is bent, its resistance increases significantly. Additionally the hybrid material preserve its electrical and optical properties against thermal oxidation condition
The graphene-mNW hybrid structure developed by the UNIST research team is a new class of electrodes and may soon find use in a variety of other applications. The research team demonstrated Inorganic light-emitting diode (ILED) devices fitted on a soft eye contact lens using the transparent, stretchable interconnects of the hybrid electrodes as an application example.
As an in vivo study, this contact lens was worn by a live rabbit eye for five hours and no abnormal behavior, such as bloodshot eye or the rubbing of eye areas were observed in the live rabbit. Wearing eye contact lenses, picture-taking and scanning, is not science fiction anymore.
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Transparent stretchable electrodes
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To produce such devices that are highly stretchable or deformable ... to the indium tin oxide (ITO) electrodes currently being utilized in transparent electrodes. The researchers additionally ...
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To produce such devices that are highly stretchable or deformable ... can have similar electrical conductivity to the indium tin oxide (ITO) electrodes currently being utilized in transparent ...
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Using this stretchable resin as a base material, Panasonic has also developed a transparent electrode material and conductive paste that remain conductive after repeated cycles of stretch and restore.
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Because the sensors are transparent ... the sensors and developed electrodes that minimize the disturbance to the magnetic field associated with MRI scanning. Though Huang and Rogers had worked ...
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Instead of using indium tin oxide (ITO) transparent electrode, the team has adopted a conductive ... When adhered on conforming surfaces, the solar cells become stretch compatible withstanding tensile ...
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They then integrated gold electrodes to the constructs to improve ... chip-integration Highly parallel integration of flexible and transparent 3-D graphene devices, and Reversible reconfiguration.
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(Nanowerk News) Today's electronic devices strive for new form factors - to make them foldable, stretchable ... conductivity to the indium tin oxide (ITO) electrodes currently being utilized in ...
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