The first bipolar transistors made of organic materials

Scientists in Germany claim to have developed bipolar transistors from organic materials, paving the way for flexible and transparent electronics.

Study, Led by Xu Jinwang, a senior researcher at the University of Technicolor Dresden, developed an organic bipolar junction transistor using doped ruby. This allows the semiconductor industry to switch to organic materials, increasing access to a wider library of materials for making electronic devices.

Transistors are the basis of current digital circuits and, at a simpler level, allow one signal to be controlled by another. By controlling the current they can amplify the signal or switch between “on” and “off” positions – these are the electrons or their positive counter (holes) or both.

There are two broad classes of transistors: field effect transistors and bipolar transistors. Most transistors are made of one mineral – silicon is the most common. Over the decades, researchers have begun to explore Use of organic materials To create transistors – which can create flexible or transparent systems – but only field-effect transistors have been successfully converted to new module components.

“Achieve high mobility [of charge carriers] It is considered directly for minerals such as silicon, but is much harder for organic materials. However, since the first organic transistor, organic solar cell and organic light-emitting diode were manufactured in the 1980s, there has been tremendous progress in the field of organic electronics, especially in the production of OLED displays, ”explained Julie Leoward. And Barry Rand of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Princeton University.

“Organic bipolar junction transistors have not been tried before because the mobility of charge carriers in organic materials is low compared to mineral semiconductors,” they said.

“The challenge, then, is to develop a functional bipolar transistor by engineering more than two movable organic matter. [types of] Commentators commented: “The low mobility characteristic of organic matter arises as part of a defect in the crystal arrangement, and the researchers have demonstrated that these images are modeled on a thin crystal template (approximately 20 nm) of an organic semiconductor called rubberine.

As a side effect of the work, the researchers were able to measure the semiconductor properties of an object known as the minority carrier diffusion length, which had not previously been tested on organic semiconductors.

“The study by Wang and colleagues suggests that the organic bipolar junction transistor may provide a way to achieve this basic criterion, helping to better understand these materials and improve existing technologies,” Lofard and Rand said.

In a research paper published in Nature on Wednesday, it was speculated that organic semiconductors could support thin-film electronics due to their low cost, carbon-based biodegradable materials and simple techniques such as evaporation or printing. This approach states, “Organic semiconductor devices can be used in the human body or in ubiquitous electronics such as those used in clothing and packaging.

They conclude, “Our results always open the door to new device ideas for high-performance organic electronics with rapid transition speeds.” ⁇