Highly Conductive Graphene/Ag Hybrid Fibers for Flexible Fiber-Type Transistors

Abstract

Mechanically robust, flexible, and electrically conductive textiles are highly suitable for use in wearable electronic applications. In this study, highly conductive and flexible graphene/Ag hybrid fibers were prepared and used as electrodes for planar and fiber-type transistors. The graphene/Ag hybrid fibers were fabricated by the wet-spinning/drawing of giant graphene oxide and subsequent functionalization with Ag nanoparticles. The graphene/Ag hybrid fibers exhibited record-high electrical conductivity of up to 15,800 S cm(-1). As the graphene/Ag hybrid fibers can be easily cut and placed onto flexible substrates by simply gluing or stitching, ion gel-gated planar transistors were fabricated by using the hybrid fibers as source, drain, and gate electrodes. Finally, fibertype transistors were constructed by embedding the graphene/Ag hybrid fiber electrodes onto conventional polyurethane monofilaments, which exhibited excellent flexibility (highly bendable and rollable properties), high electrical performance (mu(h) = 15.6 cm(2) V-1 s(-1), I-on/I-off > 10(4)), and outstanding device performance stability (stable after 1,000 cycles of bending tests and being exposed for 30 days to ambient conditions). We believe that our simple methods for the fabrication of graphene/Ag hybrid fiber electrodes for use in fiber-type transistors can potentially be applied to the development all-organic wearable devices.