High Performance Organic Thin-Film Transistor based on Amorphous A,B-Alternating Poly(arylenevinylene) Copolymers

Abstract

A series of amorphous polymers of poly(arylenevinylene) copolymers, in which heterocycles (furan, thiophene, selenophene) and dialkoxy phenylenes were alternatingly linked by vinylene unit, was prepared by the Horner−Emmons reaction. Because of high regularity of the polymer microstructure by selective formation of E olefin, the resulting polymers showed good interchain π−π stacking in thin film state despite being amorphous polymers. When the A,B-alternating poly(phenylene thiophene vinylene), in particular with the bis(heptoxy) group, was used as a semiconductor material in an organic thin-film transistor, the best hole mobility up to 0.03 cm2/(V s) was observed, which is one of the highest values recorded from amorphous polymer film. The mobility was even improved to 0.06 cm2/(V s) when the polymer was blended with well-dispersed single-wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNT). Although this mobility is lower than that from the best crystalline polymers, these amorphous polymers showed advantages such as the devi...