Optically switchable organic light-emitting transistors
Source abstract
Abstract
Organic light-emitting transistors are pivotal components for emerging opto- and nanoelectronics applications, such as logic circuitries and smart displays. Within this technology sector, the integration of multiple functionalities in a single electronic device remains the key challenge. Here we show optically switchable organic light-emitting transistors fabricated through a judicious combination of light-emitting semiconductors and photochromic molecules. Irradiation of the solution-processed films at selected wavelengths enables the efficient and reversible tuning of charge transport and electroluminescence simultaneously, with a high degree of modulation (on/off ratios up to 500) in the three primary colours. Different emitting patterns can be written and erased through a non-invasive and mask-free process, on a length scale of a few micrometres in a single device, thereby rendering this technology potentially promising for optically gated highly integrated full-colour displays and active optical memory.
Source: europepmc · Quality: candidate unverified · Source record ↗
Research context
OpenAlex topics: Photochromic and Fluorescence Chemistry · Luminescence and Fluorescent Materials · Organic Electronics and Photovoltaics
SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.
References (48)
Show source-provided references
1. Muccini, M. A bright future for organic field-effect transistors. Nat. Mater. 5, 605–613 (2006).10.1038/nmat1699 ↗
2. Cicoira, F. & Santato, C. Organic light emitting field effect transistors: advances and perspectives. Adv. Funct. Mater. 17, 3421–3434 (2007).10.1002/adfm.200700174 ↗
3. Santato, C., Cicoira, F. & Martel, R. Spotlight on organic transistors. Nat. Photon. 5, 392–393 (2011).10.1038/nphoton.2011.131 ↗
4. Zhang, C., Chen, P. & Hu, W. Organic light-emitting transistors: materials, device configurations, and operations. Small 12, 1252–1294 (2016).10.1002/smll.201502546 ↗
5. Zaumseil, J. & Sirringhaus, H. Electron and ambipolar transport in organic field-effect transistors. Chem. Rev. 107, 1296–1323 (2007).10.1021/cr0501543 ↗
6. Zaumseil, J., Friend, R. H. & Sirringhaus, H. Spatial control of the recombination zone in an ambipolar light-emitting organic transistor. Nat. Mater. 5, 69–74 (2005).10.1038/nmat1537 ↗
7. Hsu, B. B. Y. et al. Control of efficiency, brightness, and recombination zone in light-emitting field effect transistors. Adv. Mater. 24, 1171–1175 (2012).10.1002/adma.201103513 ↗
8. Swensen, J. S., Soci, C. & Heeger, A. J. Light emission from an ambipolar semiconducting polymer field-effect transistor. Appl. Phys. Lett. 87, 253511 (2005).10.1063/1.2149986 ↗
9. Bisri, S. Z. et al. High mobility and luminescent efficiency in organic single-crystal light-emitting transistors. Adv. Funct. Mater. 19, 1728–1735 (2009).10.1002/adfm.200900028 ↗
10. Capelli, R. et al. Interface functionalities in multilayer stack organic light emitting transistors (OLETs). Adv. Funct. Mater. 24, 5603–5613 (2014).10.1002/adfm.201400877 ↗
11. Capelli, R. et al. Organic light-emitting transistors with an efficiency that outperforms the equivalent light-emitting diodes. Nat. Mater. 9, 496–503 (2010).10.1038/nmat2751 ↗
12. McCarthy, M. A. et al. Low-voltage, low-power, organic light-emitting transistors for active matrix displays. Science 332, 570–573 (2011).10.1126/science.1203052 ↗
13. Zaumseil, J., Donley, C. L., Kim, J. S., Friend, R. H. & Sirringhaus, H. Efficient top-gate, ambipolar, light-emitting field-effect transistors based on a green-light-emitting polyfluorene. Adv. Mater. 18, 2708–2712 (2006).10.1002/adma.200601080 ↗
14. Gwinner, M. C. et al. Highly efficient single-layer polymer ambipolar light-emitting field-effect transistors. Adv. Mater. 24, 2728–2734 (2012).10.1002/adma.201104602 ↗
15. Ullah, M. et al. Simultaneous enhancement of brightness, efficiency, and switching in RGB organic light emitting transistors. Adv. Mater. 25, 6213–6218 (2013).10.1002/adma.201302649 ↗
16. Park, S. K. et al. Highly luminescent 2D-type slab crystals based on a molecular charge-transfer complex as promising organic light-emitting transistor materials. Adv. Mater. 29, 1701346 (2017).10.1002/adma.201701346 ↗
17. Yang, Y., da Costa, R. C., Fuchter, M. J. & Campbell, A. J. Circularly polarized light detection by a chiral organic semiconductor transistor. Nat. Photon. 7, 634–638 (2013).10.1038/nphoton.2013.176 ↗
18. Kim, Y. L. et al. Voltage-switchable photocurrents in single-walled carbon nanotube–silicon junctions for analog and digital optoelectronics. Nat. Photon. 8, 239–243 (2014).10.1038/nphoton.2014.1 ↗
19. Zhang, Y. J., Oka, T., Suzuki, R., Ye, J. T. & Iwasa, Y. Electrically switchable chiral light-emitting transistor. Science 344, 725–728 (2014).10.1126/science.1251329 ↗
20. Wang, X. et al. A spectrally tunable all-graphene-based flexible field-effect light-emitting device. Nat. Commun. 6, 7767 (2015).10.1038/ncomms8767 ↗
21. Zhang, X. Y., Hou, L. L. & Samorì, P. Coupling carbon nanomaterials with photochromic molecules for the generation of optically responsive materials. Nat. Commun. 7, 11128 (2016).10.1038/ncomms11128 ↗
22. Orgiu, E. et al. Optically switchable transistor via energy-level phototuning in a bicomponent organic semiconductor. Nat. Chem. 4, 675–679 (2012).10.1038/nchem.1384 ↗
23. Gemayel, M. E. et al. Optically switchable transistors by simple incorporation of photochromic systems into small-molecule semiconducting matrices. Nat. Commun. 6, 6330 (2015).10.1038/ncomms7330 ↗
24. Borjesson, K. et al. Optically switchable transistors comprising a hybrid photochromic molecule/n-type organic active layer. J. Mater. Chem. C 3, 4156–4161 (2015).10.1039/C5TC00401B ↗
25. Irie, M. & Mohri, M. Thermally irreversible photochromic systems. Reversible photocyclization of diarylethene derivatives. J. Org. Chem. 53, 803–808 (1988).10.1021/jo00239a022 ↗
26. Irie, M., Fukaminato, T., Matsuda, K. & Kobatake, S. Photochromism of diarylethene molecules and crystals: memories, switches, and actuators. Chem. Rev. 114, 12174–12277 (2014).10.1021/cr500249p ↗
27. Hou, L., Zhang, X., Pijper, T. C., Browne, W. R. & Feringa, B. L. Reversible photochemical control of singlet oxygen generation using diarylethene photochromic switches. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 136, 910–913 (2014).10.1021/ja4122473 ↗
28. Leydecker, T. et al. Flexible non-volatile optical memory thin-film transistor device with over 256 distinct levels based on an organic bicomponent blend. Nat. Nanotechnol. 11, 769–775 (2016).10.1038/nnano.2016.87 ↗
29. Herder, M. et al. Improving the fatigue resistance of diarylethene switches. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 137, 2738–2747 (2015).10.1021/ja513027s ↗
30. Herder, M. et al. Light-controlled reversible modulation of frontier molecular orbital energy levels in trifluoromethylated diarylethenes. Chem. Eur. J. 23, 3743–3754 (2017).10.1002/chem.201605511 ↗
31. Salleo, A., Chabinyc, M. L., Yang, M. S. & Street, R. A. Polymer thin-film transistors with chemically modified dielectric interfaces. Appl. Phys. Lett. 81, 4383–4385 (2002).10.1063/1.1527691 ↗
32. Ito, Y. et al. Crystalline ultrasmooth self-assembled monolayers of alkylsilanes for organic field-effect transistors. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 131, 9396–9404 (2009).10.1021/ja9029957 ↗
33. Lee, T.-W. & Park, O. O. The effect of different heat treatments on the luminescence efficiency of polymer light-emitting diodes. Adv. Mater. 12, 801–804 (2000).10.1002/(SICI)1521-4095(200006)12:11<801::AID-ADMA801>3.0.CO;2-G ↗
34. Grell, M., Bradley, D. D. C., Inbasekaran, M. & Woo, E. P. A glass-forming conjugated main-chain liquid crystal polymer for polarized electroluminescence applications. Adv. Mater. 9, 798–802 (1997).10.1002/adma.19970091006 ↗
35. Perevedentsev, A., Chander, N., Kim, J. S. & Bradley, D. D. C. Spectroscopic properties of poly(9,9‐dioctylfluorene) thin films possessing varied fractions of β-phase chain segments: enhanced photoluminescence efficiency via conformation structuring. J. Polym. Sci. Polym. Phys. 54, 1995–2006 (2016).10.1002/polb.24106 ↗
36. Caruso, M. E., Lattante, S., Cingolani, R. & Anni, M. Microscopic investigation of the poly(9,9-dioctylfluorene) photoluminescence dependence on the deposition conditions by confocal laser microscopy. Appl. Phys. Lett. 88, 181906 (2006).10.1063/1.2200008 ↗
37. Lim, S. F. et al. Suppression of green emission in a new class of blue-emitting PF copolymers with twisted biphenyl moieties. Adv. Funct. Mater. 15, 981–988 (2005).10.1002/adfm.200400457 ↗
38. List, E. J. W., Guentner, R., Scanducci de Freitas, P. & Scherf, U. The effect of keto defect sites on the emission properties of polyfluorene-type materials. Adv. Mater. 14, 374–378 (2002).10.1002/1521-4095(20020304)14:5<374::AID-ADMA374>3.0.CO;2-U ↗
39. Honmou, Y. et al. Single-molecule electroluminescence and photoluminescence of polyfluorene unveils the photophysics behind the green emission band. Nat. Commun. 5, 4666 (2014).10.1038/ncomms5666 ↗
40. Gong, X. et al. Stabilized blue emission from polyfluorene-based light-emitting diodes: elimination of fluorenone defects. Adv. Funct. Mater. 13, 325–330 (2003).10.1002/adfm.200304279 ↗
41. Hepp, A. et al. Light-emitting field-effect transistor based on a tetracene thin film. Phys. Rev. Lett. 91, 157406 (2003).10.1103/PhysRevLett.91.157406 ↗
42. Santato, C. et al. Tetracene-based organic light-emitting transistors: optoelectronic properties and electron injection mechanism. Synth. Met. 146, 329–334 (2004).10.1016/j.synthmet.2004.08.028 ↗
43. Roelofs, W. S. C., Adriaans, W. H., Janssen, R. A. J., Kemerink, M. & de Leeuw, D. M. Light emission in the unipolar regime of ambipolar organic field-effect transistors. Adv. Funct. Mater. 23, 4133–4139 (2013).10.1002/adfm.201203568 ↗
44. Redecker, M., Bradley, D. D. C., Inbasekaran, M. & Woo, E. P. Mobility enhancement through homogeneous nematic alignment of a liquid-crystalline polyfluorene. Appl. Phys. Lett. 74, 1400–1402 (1999).10.1063/1.123563 ↗
45. Hsu, B. B. Y. et al. Ordered polymer nanofibers enhance output brightness in bilayer light-emitting field-effect transistors. ACS Nano 7, 2344–2351 (2013).10.1021/nn305566u ↗
46. Lu, H. H., Liu, C. Y., Chang, C. H. & Chen, S. A. Self-dopant formation in poly(9,9-di-n-octylfluorene) via a dipping method for efficient and stable pure-blue electroluminescence. Adv. Mater. 19, 2574–2579 (2007).10.1002/adma.200602632 ↗
47. Zacharias, P., Gather, M. C., Köhnen, A., Rehmann, N. & Meerholz, K. Photoprogrammable organic light-emitting diodes. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 48, 4038–4041 (2009).10.1002/anie.200805969 ↗
48. Scott, J. C. & Bozano, L. D. Nonvolatile memory elements based on organic materials. Adv. Mater. 19, 1452–1463 (2007).10.1002/adma.200602564 ↗