An Intrinsically Stretchable High‐Performance Polymer Semiconductor with Low Crystallinity
Abstract
For wearable and implantable electronics applications, developing intrinsically stretchable polymer semiconductor is advantageous, especially in the manufacturing of large‐area and high‐density devices. A major challenge is to simultaneously achieve good electrical and mechanical properties for these semiconductor devices. While crystalline domains are generally needed to achieve high mobility, amorphous domains are necessary to impart stretchability. Recent progresses in the design of high‐performance donor–acceptor polymers that exhibit low degrees of energetic disorder, while having a high fraction of amorphous domains, appear promising for polymer semiconductors. Here, a low crystalline, i.e., near‐amorphous, indacenodithiophene‐co‐benzothiadiazole (IDTBT) polymer and a semicrystalline thieno[3,2‐b]thiophene‐diketopyrrolopyrrole (DPPTT) are compared, for mechanical properties and electrical performance under strain. It is observed that IDTBT is able to achieve both a high modulus and high fracture strain, and to preserve electrical functionality under high strain. Next, fully stretchable transistors are fabricated using the IDTBT polymer and observed mobility ≈0.6 cm2 V−1 s−1 at 100% strain along stretching direction. In addition, the morphological evolution of the stretched IDTBT films is investigated by polarized UV–vis and grazing‐incidence X‐ray diffraction to elucidate the molecular origins of high ductility. In summary, the near‐amorphous IDTBT polymer signifies a promising direction regarding molecular design principles toward intrinsically stretchable high‐performance polymer semiconductor.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Sep 12, 2019
- Source ID
- 10.1002/adfm.201905340
Entities
People
- Ging‐ji Nathan Wang
- Helen Tran
- Hongping Yan
- Hu Chen
- Hung‐chin Wu
- Iain McCulloch
- Jaewan Mun
- Jeffrey B.‐h. Tok
- Jiheong Kang
- Mark Nikolka
- Pak Yan Yuen
- Reinhold H. Dauskardt
- Song Zhang
- Xiaodan Gu
- Yu Zheng
- Zhenan Bao
Organizations
- Air Force Office of Scientific Research
- European Commission
- Intelligence Community Postdoctoral Research Fellowship Program
- King Abdullah University of Science and Technology
- National Science Foundation
- Office of Basic Energy Sciences
- Office of Science
- Stanford University
- United States Department of Energy
- University of Southern Mississippi