Electrochemical Copper Deposition in Etched Ion Track Membranes

Abstract

Etched ion track polycarbonate membranes served as templates for the potentiostatic deposition of copper nanowires. For different overvoltages, current vs. time curves were recorded and analyzed. A qualitative model describing the deposition process has been developed. Up to six different time periods can be distinguished in each curve corresponding to different steps that dominate the overall deposition process. For short times, copper deposition is controlled by charge transfer. Then a transition region follows where the charge transfer and the diffusion overvoltage are comparable. The following three regions are assigned to diffusion control. Initially, while the thickness of the diffusion layers is smaller than the remaining empty pore length, the diffusion occurs linearly inside the pores. When the diffusion layers increase in size, the overall process becomes determined by radial diffusion of ions toward the pore openings. After some time the radial diffusion fields start to overlap for neighboring pores, and the deposition is characterized by linear diffusion toward the whole surface. Finally, when the pores are filled up with copper, metal caps start to grow on top of the membrane. For each time regime, existing theories were used to analyze the process quantitatively. Agreement with experimental data was found for two regimes.

Uniform Large-Area Free-Standing Silver Nanowire Arrays on Transparent Conducting Substrates

“…This agrees well with the Faraday's law 35 and proves a uniform nanowire growth under the applied electrodeposition conditions. Since only a small portion of AAO pores are filled with Ag at the beginning of the electrodeposition, Figure 7.…”

A study on electrochemical growth behavior of the Co–Ni alloy nanowires in anodic aluminum oxide template

“…Changing the parameters of anodizing process makes it feasible to fabricate templates with different pore geometries [16][17][18][19][20][21][22]. Some mechanism studies on metallic nanowires electrodeposition have been done [23][24][25][26][27][28]. In ac voltage electrodeposition of nanowires in AAO templates [6,8,21], reduction of cations normally occurs in cathodic half cycle of current and in the followed anodic half cycle the current drops to zero and polarization decrease [29].…”

Low Electrical Percolation Threshold of Silver and Copper Nanowires in Polystyrene Composites

“…[34,35] Silver and copper nanowires have also been synthesized in hard templates such as polycarbonate or PAO using electroless deposition, [22] DC electrodeposition, [36][37][38][39][40] and AC electrodeposition. [41,42] However, only the method of AC electrodeposition in PAO templates is amenable to scale-up in order to achieve kilogram production of nanowires.…”