High-strength nanoporous silver produced by inkjet printing

Nanoporous silver films with ligament size in the range 80-250 nm have been produced by inkjet printing silver neodeconoate solutions followed by sintering. The strength of the films is a function of the ligament size and exceeds 1 GPa for the smallest diameter ligaments. The scale dependence of strength is similar to that found with silver micropillars and nanoporous gold or copper. Deformation structures are dominated by twinning and partial dislocations.