Recycling of Nanowire Percolation Network for Sustainable Soft Electronics

Abstract

There is an increasing demand for eco‐friendly and sustainable electronics, where recycling of functional materials is the key. Soft electronics have received much attention recently, however, their recycling has been challenging. Here a strategy is reported to recycle silver nanowire (AgNW) percolation network to achieve sustainable soft electronics. The effect of working solvent and ultrasonication time on the morphology and electrical properties of the recycled AgNW network is investigated. Using the selected working solvent with low surface tension (isopropanol) and optimal ultrasonication time (20 s), the AgNW network film can be recycled multiple times (four times in this work) without significant morphology changes and performance degradation. A transient epidermal sensor patch using AgNW as electrodes and a water‐soluble polymer substrate is fabricated and fully recycled. On‐body test of the epidermal sensor patch fabricated by recycled AgNWs demonstrates a working example for the recycling concept of AgNWs. The recycling concept can be extended to other nanomaterials in the form of percolation network.

Robust and Reprocessable Artificial Muscles Based on Liquid Crystal Elastomers with Dynamic Thiourea Bonds

“…Because a majority of soft electronic devices are hybrid materials composed of a soft matrix and conductive materials (e.g., metallic or inorganic fillers), [62][63][64] the ability to reuse both the metallic wire and the LCE-TUEG matrix can be a considerable advantage toward the development of sustainable soft electronics. [65] Finally, we designed and created a biomimetic artificial hand by welding five LCE-TUEG fingers and an LCE-TUEG palm embedded with resistive heating wires (Figure 6a). After assembly, the five fingers were uniaxially aligned assisted by Joule heating, and rigid Kapton tape was integrated onto the rear side of each finger (Figure 6b).…”

Technology Roadmap for Flexible Sensors

“…A few examples of recent progress in this area ,− include aqueously recyclable circuits, recyclable and reconfigurable hybrid integrated sensor patches, and upcycling of compact discs for stretchable biosensors . Nanomaterials manufactured bottom-up show promising recycling potential when the polymer substrate/matrix and the working solution are properly paired. , A more advanced concept over recycling is disassembly for remanufacturing, , which may be explored in the future. Besides recycling, another strategy is to synthesize or to utilize degradable materials to minimize the impact of disposal ( e.g.…”

Multiscale investigation of the fate of silver during printed paper electronics recycling

“…Whereas the recycling of soft electronics printed on polymer requires organic solvents, we can mention that these processes only make use of water and detergent [28].…”