Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.
Nanoscale. 2019 Jan 17;11(3):1074-1079. doi: 10.1039/c8nr09120j.
Carrier transport in a wide range of nanomaterial assemblies proceeds by percolation through discontinuous networks of constituents. Improving percolative nanomaterials could enhance transparent conductors, sensors, and electronic devices. A significant obstacle in optimizing percolative materials is the challenge in their characterization. The critical connection pathways which determine a percolative material's conductivity are not easily accessible with existing metrology tools and traditional investigation approaches rely on indirect methods based on many samples and on simplifying assumptions. We here demonstrate the direct extraction of characteristic parameters from a single sample by analyzing the strain-dependent resistance of percolative materials. An analytical model is derived that can explain experimental data for various percolative materials, morphologies, and straining conditions. The relationship of the extracted parameters with previously introduced figures of merit allows us to compare nanostructures of diverse dimensionalities and compositions for applications such as strain gauges and transparent conductors.
在各种纳米材料组件中，载体传输通过不连续的成分网络进行渗滤。改进渗滤纳米材料可以增强透明导体、传感器和电子设备。优化渗滤材料的一个重要障碍是其表征的挑战。决定渗滤材料电导率的关键连接途径不容易通过现有的计量工具来实现，传统的研究方法依赖于基于许多样本的间接方法和简化假设。我们在这里通过分析渗滤材料的应变电阻来证明从单个样本中直接提取特征参数。得出了一个解析模型，可以解释各种渗滤材料、形态和应变条件下的实验数据。提取参数与之前介绍的性能指标的关系允许我们比较不同维度和组成的纳米结构，例如应变计和透明导体。
