Cotton Fiber-Based 1D Conductor：A New Type of Flexible Wire for Cryogenic Electrical System

Abstract

In response to the problem of poor flexibility of common one-dimensional flexible conductors at low temperatures, this paper proposed a one-dimensional flexible conductive composite material with cotton fiber as the substrate and silver-nanowires as the conductive fillers to meet the demands of flexible conductors in low temperature fields such as space exploration, superconductivity, low-temperature biology, etc.Through a creative "bottom-up" fabricating process, by adjusting the amount of filler added and the degree of intertwining between cotton fibers, 1D flexible conductor with good flexibility, conductivity, strength and stability is obtained. After 10,000 times of flexibility tests at liquid nitrogen temperature (77K), the resistance change of the 1D conductor is less than ±0.5%, showing excellent flexibility and stability of the material at low temperature environment. A demonstration was then successfully conducted by connecting the 1D conductor to the circuit as the flexible part of the system in simulated working environment (77K). The system worked well with good stability under repeated bending of the mechanical arm, demonstrating high applying potential of the 1D conductor in the field of low-temperature flexible conductive materials.