Issue

Vol. 12 (2020)

Biomimic Vein-Like Transparent Conducting Electrodes with Low Sheet Resistance and Metal Consumption

https://doi.org/10.1007/s40820-019-0359-9
Guobin Jia
Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT), Albert‑Einstein‑Str. 9, 07745 Jena, Germany
Jonathan Plentz
Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT), Albert‑Einstein‑Str. 9, 07745 Jena, Germany
Andrea Dellith
Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT), Albert‑Einstein‑Str. 9, 07745 Jena, Germany
Christa Schmidt
Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT), Albert‑Einstein‑Str. 9, 07745 Jena, Germany
Jan Dellith
Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT), Albert‑Einstein‑Str. 9, 07745 Jena, Germany
Gabriele Schmidl
Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT), Albert‑Einstein‑Str. 9, 07745 Jena, Germany
Gudrun Andrä
Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT), Albert‑Einstein‑Str. 9, 07745 Jena, Germany

Corresponding Author: Guobin Jia

guobin.jia@leibniz‑ipht.de

Nano-Micro Letters, Vol. 12 (2020), Article Number: 19

Abstract

In this contribution, inspired by the excellent resource management and material transport function of leaf veins, the electrical transport function of metallized leaf veins is mimicked from the material transport function of the vein networks. By electroless copper plating on real leaf vein networks with copper thickness of only several hundred nanometre up to several micrometre, certain leaf veins can be converted to transparent conductive electrodes with an ultralow sheet resistance 100 times lower than that of state-of-the-art indium tin oxide thin films, combined with a broadband optical transmission of above 80% in the UV–VIS–IR range. Additionally, the resource efficiency of the vein-like electrode is characterized by the small amount of material needed to build up the networks and the low copper consumption during metallization. In particular, the high current density transport capability of the electrode of > 6000 A cm−2 was demonstrated. These superior properties of the vein-like structures inspire the design of high-performance transparent conductive electrodes without using critical materials and may significantly reduce the Ag consumption down to < 10% of the current level for mass production of solar cells and will contribute greatly to the electrode for high power density concentrator solar cells, high power density Li-ion batteries, and supercapacitors.


Highlights:


1 The electrical transport of the metallized vein networks is mimicked from the material transport function of the leaf vein networks.
2 The vein-like transparent conducting electrodes show ultralow sheet resistance < 0.1 Ω □−1, broadband optical transparency > 80%, and high current density transport capability > 6000 A cm−2.
3 The metal consumption for the metallization of the leaf veins can be as low as 4 g m−2.

Keywords

Biomimic leaf vein network Transparent conducting electrode Sheet resistance Metal consumption
Jia, Guobin, Jonathan Plentz, Andrea Dellith, Christa Schmidt, Jan Dellith, Gabriele Schmidl, and Gudrun Andrä. 2020. “Biomimic Vein-Like Transparent Conducting Electrodes With Low Sheet Resistance and Metal Consumption”. Nano-Micro Letters 12 (January):19. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40820-019-0359-9.
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