Since the discovery of highly conducting polyacetylene by Shirakawa, MacDiarmid, and Heeger in 1977, π-conjugated systems have attracted much attention as futuristic materials for the development and production of the next generation of electronics, that is, organic electronics. Conceptually, organic electronics are quite different from conventional inorganic solid state electronics because the structural versatility of organic semiconductors allows for the incorporation of functionality by molecular design. This versatility leads to a new era in the design of electronic devices. To date, the great number of π-conjugated semiconducting materials that have either been discovered or synthesized generate an exciting library of π-conjugated systems for use in organic electronics. 11 However, some key challenges for further advancement remain: the low mobility and stability of organic semiconductors, the lack of knowledge regarding structure property relationships for understanding the fundamental chemical aspects behind the structural design, and realization of desired properties. Organic field-effect transistors (OFETs) are a kind of device consisting of an organic semiconducting layer, a gate insulator layer, and three terminals (drain, source, and gate electrodes). OFETs are not only essential building blocks for the next generation of cheap and flexible organic circuits, but they also provide an important insight into the charge transport of πconjugated systems. Therefore, they act as strong tools for the exploration of the structure property relationships of πconjugated systems, such as parameters of field-effect mobility (μ, the drift velocity of carriers under unit electric field), current on/off ratio (the ratio of the maximum on-state current to the minimum off-state current), and threshold voltage (the minimum gate voltage that is required to turn on the transistor). 17 Since the discovery of OFETs in the 1980s, they have attracted much attention. Research onOFETs includes the discovery, design, and synthesis of π-conjugated systems for OFETs, device optimization, development of applications in radio frequency identification (RFID) tags, flexible displays, electronic papers, sensors, and so forth. It is beyond the scope of this review to cover all aspects of π-conjugated systems; hence, our focus will be on the performance analysis of π-conjugated systems in OFETs. This should make it possible to extract information regarding the fundamental merit of semiconducting π-conjugated materials and capture what is needed for newmaterials and what is the synthesis orientation of newπ-conjugated systems. In fact, for a new science with many practical applications, the field of organic electronics is progressing extremely rapidly. For example, using “organic field effect transistor” or “organic field effect transistors” as the query keywords to search the Web of Science citation database, it is possible to show the distribution of papers over recent years as shown in Figure 1A. It is very clear

Semiconducting π-conjugated systems in field-effect transistors: a material odyssey of organic electronics.

The optoelectronic properties of polymeric semiconductor materials can be utilized for the fabrication of organic electronic and photonic devices. When key structural requirements are met, these materials exhibit unique properties such as solution processability, large charge transporting capabilities, and/or broad optical absorption. In this review recent developments in the area of π-conjugated polymeric semiconductors for organic thin-film (or field-effect) transistors (OTFTs or OFETs) and bulk-heterojunction photovoltaic (or solar) cell (BHJ-OPV or OSC) applications are summarized and analyzed.

π-Conjugated Polymers for Organic Electronics and Photovoltaic Cell Applications†

Over the past 25 years, organic field-effect transistors (OFETs) have witnessed impressive improvements in materials performance by 3–4 orders of magnitude, and many of the key materials discoveries have been published in Advanced Materials. This includes some of the most recent demonstrations of organic field-effect transistors with performance that clearly exceeds that of benchmark amorphous silicon-based devices. In this article, state-of-the-art in OFETs are reviewed in light of requirements for demanding future applications, in particular active-matrix addressing for flexible organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays. An overview is provided over both small molecule and conjugated polymer materials for which field-effect mobilities exceeding > 1 cm2 V–1 s–1 have been reported. Current understanding is also reviewed of their charge transport physics that allows reaching such unexpectedly high mobilities in these weakly van der Waals bonded and structurally comparatively disordered materials with a view towards understanding the potential for further improvement in performance in the future.

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25th anniversary article: organic field-effect transistors: the path beyond amorphous silicon.

Human skin is a remarkable organ. It consists of an integrated, stretchable network of sensors that relay information about tactile and thermal stimuli to the brain, allowing us to maneuver within our environment safely and effectively. Interest in large-area networks of electronic devices inspired by human skin is motivated by the promise of creating autonomous intelligent robots and biomimetic prosthetics, among other applications. The development of electronic networks comprised of flexible, stretchable, and robust devices that are compatible with large-area implementation and integrated with multiple functionalities is a testament to the progress in developing an electronic skin (e-skin) akin to human skin. E-skins are already capable of providing augmented performance over their organic counterpart, both in superior spatial resolution and thermal sensitivity. They could be further improved through the incorporation of additional functionalities (e.g., chemical and biological sensing) and desired properties (e.g., biodegradability and self-powering). Continued rapid progress in this area is promising for the development of a fully integrated e-skin in the near future.

25th Anniversary Article: The Evolution of Electronic Skin (E-Skin): A Brief History, Design Considerations, and Recent Progress

Printing electronic devices using semiconducting 'ink' is seen as a promising route to cheap, large-area and flexible electronics, but the performance of such devices suffers from the relatively poor crystallinity of the printed material. Hiromi Minemawari and colleagues have developed an inkjet-based printing technique involving controlled mixing on a surface of two solutions — the semiconductor (C8-BTBT) in its solvent and a liquid in which the semiconductor is insoluble. The products of this antisolvent crystallization technique are thin semiconductor films with exceptionally high and uniform crystallinity. The use of single crystals has been fundamental to the development of semiconductor microelectronics and solid-state science1. Whether based on inorganic2,3,4,5 or organic6,7,8 materials, the devices that show the highest performance rely on single-crystal interfaces, with their nearly perfect translational symmetry and exceptionally high chemical purity. Attention has recently been focused on developing simple ways of producing electronic devices by means of printing technologies. ‘Printed electronics’ is being explored for the manufacture of large-area and flexible electronic devices by the patterned application of functional inks containing soluble or dispersed semiconducting materials9,10,11. However, because of the strong self-organizing tendency of the deposited materials12,13, the production of semiconducting thin films of high crystallinity (indispensable for realizing high carrier mobility) may be incompatible with conventional printing processes. Here we develop a method that combines the technique of antisolvent crystallization14 with inkjet printing to produce organic semiconducting thin films of high crystallinity. Specifically, we show that mixing fine droplets of an antisolvent and a solution of an active semiconducting component within a confined area on an amorphous substrate can trigger the controlled formation of exceptionally uniform single-crystal or polycrystalline thin films that grow at the liquid–air interfaces. Using this approach, we have printed single crystals of the organic semiconductor 2,7-dioctyl[1]benzothieno[3,2-b][1]benzothiophene (C8-BTBT) (ref. 15), yielding thin-film transistors with average carrier mobilities as high as 16.4 cm2 V−1 s−1. This printing technique constitutes a major step towards the use of high-performance single-crystal semiconductor devices for large-area and flexible electronics applications.

Inkjet printing of single-crystal films

2,7-Dialkyl[1]benzothieno[3,2-b]benzothiophenes were tested as solution-processible molecular semiconductors. Thin films of the organic semiconductors deposited on Si/SiO2 substrates by spin coating have well-ordered structures as confirmed by XRD analysis. Evaluations of the devices under ambient conditions showed typical p-channel FET responses with the field-effect mobility higher than 1.0 cm2 V-1 s-1 and Ion/Ioff of ∼107.

Highly soluble [1]benzothieno[3,2-b]benzothiophene (BTBT) derivatives for high-performance, solution-processed organic field-effect transistors.

Organic thin-fi lm transistors (OTFTs) have attracted great interest for their potential use in several electronic applications, including active-matrix displays, electronic paper, and chemical sensors. [ 1 ] Among the many semiconducting materials evaluated in the TFT confi guration, pentacene is the best as it shows the highest fi eld-effect mobility ( > 3.0 cm 2 V − 1 s − 1 ). [ 2 , 3 ] On the other hand, new organic semiconductors are being actively investigated to further improve the performance of OTFTs. In fact, superior unconventional organic semiconductors used to produce high-performance OTFTs have been recently reported, including picene (3.2 cm 2 V − 1 s − 1 ), [ 4 ] trans -1,2-dithieno[2,3b ′ :3,2d ′ ]thiophene ethene (DTTE, 2.0 cm 2 V − 1 s − 1 ), [ 5 ] dithieno[2,3d ;2 ′ ,3 ′ d ′ ]benzo[1,2b ;4,5b ′ ]dithiophene (DTBDT, 1.7 cm 2 V − 1

Alkylated dinaphtho[2,3-b:2′,3′-f]thieno[3,2-b]thiophenes (Cn-DNTTs): Organic semiconductors for high-performance thin-film transistors

Flexible transistors and circuits based on dinaphtho-[2,3-b:2',3'-f]thieno[3,2-b]thiophene (DNTT), a conjugated semiconductor with a large ionization potential (5.4 eV), are reported. The transistors have a mobility of 0.6 cm(2) V-1 s(-1) and the ring oscillators have a stage delay of 18 mu s. Due to the excellent stability of the semiconductor, the devices and circuits maintain 50% of their initial performance for a period of 8 months in ambient air.

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Flexible low-voltage organic transistors and circuits based on a high-mobility organic semiconductor with good air stability.

Organic transistors and circuits are fabricated directly on the surface of banknotes. The transistors operate with voltages of 3 V and have a field-effect mobility of about 0.2 cm2 V−1s−1. For an array of 100 transistors a yield of 92% is obtained.

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Organic electronics on banknotes.

Disclosed is a field-effect transistor characterized by using a compound represented by the formula (1) below as a semiconductor material. (In the formula (1), X1 and X2 independently represent a sulfur atom, a selenium atom or a tellurium atom; and R1 and R2 independently represent an unsubstituted or halogeno-substituted C1-C36 aliphatic hydrocarbon group.)

Masaaki Ikeda

Papers

Highly soluble [1]benzothieno[3,2-b]benzothiophene (BTBT) derivatives for high-performance, solution-processed organic field-effect transistors.

Alkylated dinaphtho[2,3-b:2′,3′-f]thieno[3,2-b]thiophenes (Cn-DNTTs): Organic semiconductors for high-performance thin-film transistors

Flexible low-voltage organic transistors and circuits based on a high-mobility organic semiconductor with good air stability.

Organic electronics on banknotes.

Field-effect transistor