Evaluation of nanocomposite gate insulators for flexible organic thin-film transistors

To develop physically flexible electronics, high performance and mechanical stability of component materials and devices are required. For a flexible display, a backplane with flexible thin-film transistors (TFTs) must be developed. Gate insulating materials with excellent electrical and mechanical properties are highly important to the development of flexible TFTs. We investigated nanocomposite gate dielectrics composed of polyimide (PI) because of their superior thermal stability, as well as different inorganic HfO2, TiO2, and Al2O3 nanoparticles with high dielectric constants. Nanocomposite gate dielectrics of HfO2 nanoparticles and PI lowered leakage current density and increased the relative dielectric constant compared to PI solely because of a high degree of dispersion. Pentacene TFTs with HfO2 nanocomposite gate insulators also showed higher field-effect mobility (μ), smaller subthreshold swing, and an enhanced on/off current ratio (I(on/off)) compared to those of the PI gate dielectric. In addition, mechanical cyclic bending tests involving bending cycles of 2 x 10(5) time sat a bending radius of 5 mm showed improvement in electrical stability of nanocomposite gate insulators with a change in leakage current density of nanocomposite gate insulators below 30%.