Laser shock-based platform for controllable forming of nanowires

One-dimensional nanomaterials have attracted a great deal of research interest in the past few decades due to their unique mechanical, electrical, and optical properties. Changing the shape of nanowires (NWs) is both challenging and crucial to change the property and open wide functions of NWs, such as strain engineering, electronic transport, mechanical properties, band structure, and quantum properties, etc. Here we report a scalable strategy to conduct cutting, bending, and periodic straining of NWs by making use of laser shock pressure. Three-dimensional shaping of silver NWs is demonstrated, during which the Ag NWs exhibit very good ductility (strain-to-failure reaches 110%). Meanwhile, the high electrical conductivity of Ag NWs could retain well under controlled laser shock pressure. The microstructure observation indicates that the main deformation mechanism in Ag NWs under dynamic loading is formation of twinning and stacking fault, while dislocation motion and pile-up is less obvious. This method could be applied to semiconductor NWs as well.