Demonstration of Wide Spectrum Transparent Conductive Composite Films Based on Silver Nanowires and Graphene

Silver nanowires (AgNWs) and graphene play quite important roles in many fields, such as the development of transparent conductive films. Nevertheless, the existence of defects renders the use of this effect problematic. In this work, we designed three different structures to leverage the unique properties that originate when graphene is combined with AgNWs. More specifically, the following configurations were fabricated: AgNWs + Graphene (AG), Graphene + AgNWs (GA) and graphene + AgNWs + Graphene (GAG). Interestingly, the combination of AgNWs with the graphene layer provides an additional conduction pathway for the electron transfer and collection at the electrode. By analyzing the transmittance spectrum, sheet resistance and stability of the three different kinds of composite films, it is inferred that AG film has the optimal structure. The average transmittance of the AG film is 78.5% in the 500-2000 nm band and 71.4% in the 2000-10,000 nm band, whereas the sheet resistance is 28 Omega sq(-1). The most stable structure is the GAG, since the increase in the sheet resistance is minimal after two months.