Simple assembly of long nanowires through substrate stretching

Although nanowire (NW) alignment has been previously investigated, minimizing limitations such as process complexity and NW breakage, as well as quantifying the quality of alignment, have not been sufficiently addressed. A simple, low cost, large-area, and versatile alignment method is reported that is applicable for NWs either grown on a substrate or synthesized in solution. Metal and semiconductor NWs with average lengths of up to 16 μm are aligned through the stretching of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) films, which compared to other stretching methods results in superior alignment because of the large stretching ratio of PVA. Poly[oxy(methyl-1,2-ethanediyl)] is employed as lubricant to prevent NW breakage. To quantify NW alignment, a simple and effective image processing method is presented. The alignment process results in an order parameter (S) of NW alignment as high as 0.97.