Spherical silver nanoparticles with various sizes and standard deviations were synthesized by the polyol process. Two different synthesis methods were compared in order to investigate the influence of reaction parameters on the resulting particle size and its distribution. In the precursor heating method, wherein a solution containing silver nitrate was heated to the reaction temperature, the ramping rate was determined to be a critical parameter affecting the particle size. In contrast, in the precursor injection method, in which a silver nitrate aqueous solution was injected into hot ethylene glycol, because of rapid nucleation, the injection rate and the reaction temperature were important factors in terms of reducing the particle size and attaining monodispersity. Silver nanoparticles with a size of 17 ± 2 nm were obtained at an injection rate of 2.5 ml s(-1) and a reaction temperature of 100 °C.

The authors have investigated the influence of conductive ink compositions on the quality of ink-jet printed patterns. Controlling the solvent compositions plays an important role of reducing the so-called coffee ring effect. The use of a higher boiling point solvent with lower surface tension such as ethylene glycol enables the formation of a uniform deposit of silver nanoparticles due to surface tension gradient-induced inward Marangoni flow, which can compensate outward convective flow. It is demonstrated that the ink-jet printed film quality is directly related to the resistance difference in the conductive patterns.