R2R vacuum plating and precise gold plating film on transparent, flexible, lightweight, large-sized PI PET film/foil

With the rise of new products such as mobile terminals, wearable devices, and smart furniture, electrical transparency, flexibility, lightweight, large size, and low price have become the basic elements of this industry. As a common use of these devicesThin film materialsTransparent conductive electrodes not only require good optoelectronic performance, but also essential features such as mechanical flexibility, large size, and low cost. Traditional metal oxidesTransparent conductive electrode(For example, ITO), due to its high cost and brittle quality, its position is constantly being challenged. In recent years, various ITO substitute materials and technologies have flourished, and many new transparent conductive materials have emerged, such as carbon nanotubes, graphene, conductive polymers, metal nanowires, and metal grid electrodes.

Although these new technologies may not fully replace traditional ITO in the short term, they each have unique advantages and strengths. In recent years, the proportion of industries that have applied new materials and technologies has been increasing year by year. Among these new transparent electrodes, graphene is still in the research and development stage, and there is still a long way to go before mass production. The industrial mass production technology of carbon nanotubes is not yet mature, and the film performance has not yet reached the traditional ITO performance. Metal nanowires and metal networks (grids) are the main players in ITO alternative materials and technologies due to their many advantages.

From the perspective of continuous thin film materials, transparency and conductivity are a contradictory pair, just like how bear's paw and fish cannot coexist.Porous metal thin film(Sacrificing some of the conductivity of metal grids to improve their transparency provides an important solution for transparent conductive materials. They are like an invisible fishing net, invisible to the naked eye, but interconnected, meaning that electricity can flow freely. In fact, various networks can be seen everywhere in nature, and scientists are racking their brains on how to use them. Some people use expensive technologies (laser, nano imprinting, etc.) to achieve regular grids, others use self-assembly technologies (foam boundary, coffee ring effect, crystal boundary, etc.) to achieve random grids, and even more people use leaf veins and spider silk networks as templates to achieve fractal and high elasticity