A facile method for preparing highly conductive and reflective surface-silvered polyimide films

A novel method was developed for the preparation of reflective and electrically conductive surface-silvered polyimide (PI) films. The polyimide films were functionalized with poly(dopamine), simply by dipping the PI films into aqueous dopamine solution and mildly stirring at room temperature. Electroless plating of silver was readily carried out on the poly(dopamine) deposited PI (PI-DOPA) surface. The surface compositions of the modified PI films were studied by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). XPS results show that the PI-DOPA surfaces were successfully deposited with ploy(dopamine) and were ready for electroless deposition of silver. The poly(dopamine) layer was used not only as the chemi-sorption sites for silver particles during the electroless plating of silver, but also as an adhesion promotion layer for the electrolessly deposited silver. The as-prepared silvered PI films show high conductivity and reflectivity, with a surface resistance of 1.5 Ω and a reflectivity of 95%, respectively.