Biodegradable Materials for Organic Field-Effect Transistors on a Paper Substrate

Paper-based pentacene organic thin-film transistors (OTFTs) with spin-coated gelatin (G) stacked gate dielectric layers, the Au/pentacene/G/G matrix-embedded iron (FeG)/Al/paper structure, were fabricated. The proposed composite-stacked bio-dielectric layer can be implemented using solutions with the degradable biomaterials. These materials enable a large-area printing of use-and-throw devices. Control devices (Au/pentacene/G/Al and Au/pentacene/FeG/Al structure) were also fabricated for comparison. High-performance paper-based OTFT constructed from the stacked gate dielectric layer exhibited a carrier mobility of 8 cm2/Vs, an ON/OFF current ratio of approximately 103, a subthreshold swing of 0.6 V/decade, and a threshold voltage of -1.4 V. These results are compatible to those OTFTs fabricated on other substrates. Therefore, the emerging biomaterial-based transistors on paper substrates may help in developing low-cost, environment-friendly devices.