Micromachines (Feb 2019)

Self-Healing Flexible Conductive Film by Repairing Defects via Flowable Liquid Metal Droplets

  • Ruiwen Niu,
  • Mingliang Jin,
  • Jieping Cao,
  • Zhibin Yan,
  • Jinwei Gao,
  • Hao Wu,
  • Guofu Zhou,
  • Lingling Shui

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/mi10020113
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 10, no. 2
p. 113

Abstract

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Self-healing flexible conductive films have been fabricated, evaluated, and applied. The film is composed of a fragile indium tin oxide (ITO) layer covered with sprayed liquid metal (LM) droplets. Self-healing of electrical conductivity is achieved via spontaneous capillary wicking of LM droplets into cracks/defects of the ITO film. The liquid metal adhering onto the ITO layer can also connect the ITO fragments during bending to keep the overall conductivity of the composite LM/ITO film stable. Stable and reversible electrowetting performance has been achieved with the composite LM/ITO as the conductive film, in either flat or curved states.

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