Improvement of single-walled carbon nanotube transparent conductive films using substrate pretreatment

This study sought to improve the characteristics of single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) transparent conductive films (TCFs), such as their sheet resistance and transparency, by applying pre-treatments to their PET substrates. Oxygen–argon plasma pretreatment was found to increase the surface energies of the PET substrates from 33.9 to 74.2 mJ/m2, which improves the electric conductivity of the SWCNT-TCFs and provides a lower sheet resistance at a given light transmittance. Polymer electrolyte solution pretreatment was used to vary the surface functionality and modulate the surface charges quantitatively, as confirmed by the measurement of the resulting substrate zeta potentials, which varied between −45.8 and 18.2 mV. When the surfaces became negatively charged through pretreatment, the electric conductivities of the SWCNT-TCFs were increased. Both pre-treatments also improve the adsorption of SWCNTs onto the PET substrates and reduce the loss of coating solution during the spray deposition of SWCNTs.

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► Surface pretreatment increased the electric conductivity of carbon nanotube layer.
► Plasma treatment increased surface energy of PET, which increased the conductivity.
► Polymer electrolyte modulates surface charges, which determines the conductivity.
► Surfce pretreatment increased the adsorption of carbon nanotube on PET surface.