If silver is the best conductor of electricity, why is gold used in electronics instead?
In: Engineering
Silver oxidizes, and silver oxide is not a very good conductor. Silver would be a great choice for an insulated wire, but then you run into the problem that it’s not really very strong either, so your very expensive wire would tend to break. If you’re doing something where very low resistance is necessary, and strength and cost aren’t that important (example: the Manhattan Project) then silver or gold wire is wonderful. (Well, it *was* wonderful until we invented superconductors.)
For most small-scale stuff, though, copper is fine, and gold works great for a non-oxidizing contact on the end, where it’s exposed to the air. For larger scale stuff, like power lines, aluminum is good enough, and much cheaper.
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