Low-molecular weight polydimethylsiloxane, a versatile performance enhancer for the solution processed indium tin oxide transparent electrode

Abstract An ultra-thin low molecular weight (LMW) polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) layer is introduced as an agent to enhance the electrical conductivity, transmittance, and anti-fogging function of a solution-processed indium tin oxide (ITO) thin film transparent electrode. Under argon plasma, Si-C bonds of LMW PDMS are easily broken and become Si dangling bonds, which consumes oxygen from the ITO thin film, producing oxygen vacancies; at the same time, these bonds turn into SiOx and serve as an optical layer to reduce the reflectivity of the thin film. As a result, the ITO’s figure of merit, which is a performance index for transparent electrodes, increased by more than 10 times by the adoption of the agent LMW PDMS. Additionally, the SiOx layer hydrophilizes the ITO surface so as to reinforce its anti-fogging ability. Using this SiOx layer, an anti-fogging smart ITO glass was fabricated, which showed twice faster ability to eliminate the haze due to dew condensation on the ITO surface compared to the conventional ITO thin film.