Electronic devices made from single crystal thin films attached to inexpensive support substrates offer reduced material costs compared to wafer-based devices; however, scalable and inexpensive processes for producing these single crystal film structures have remained elusive.
Although organic thin film transistors (OTFTs) made from organic semiconductors are valued for their transparency, flexibility and low cost attributes, their sluggish response time due to slow carrier mobility limits their applications.
Stanford researchers have developed a versatile molecular engineering approach, via random copolymerization, to gain good processability while maintaining high charge transport and photovoltaic performance for conjugated copolymers.
Researchers in Prof. Zhenan Bao's laboratory have invented a novel semiconducting material containing siloxane-containing side chains. This material demonstrates high charge carrier mobility, as well as air and operational stability in field effect transistor devices.