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Buckled Thin-Film Transistors and Circuits on Soft Elastomers for Stretchable Electronics
Giuseppe Cantarella1, Christian Vogt1, Raoul Hopf2
1Institute for Electronics, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology , Gloriastrasse 35, Zürich, 8092, Switzerland.
ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces
|August 11, 2017
Summary
Researchers developed a novel technique for creating wrinkled surfaces on flexible electronics, enabling high bendability and stretchability without compromising performance. This advancement paves the way for advanced wearable and implantable electronic devices.
Area of Science:
- Materials Science
- Electronics Engineering
- Nanotechnology
Background:
- Flexible electronics require high bendability and stretchability for applications like wearables.
- Current fabrication methods often lack systematic approaches for achieving these properties simultaneously with low complexity.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop a fabrication technique for highly flexible and stretchable electronics with enhanced performance.
- To demonstrate the integration of thin-film transistors (TFTs) and circuits on wrinkled substrates.
Main Methods:
- Inducing randomly oriented and customized wrinkles on biocompatible elastomeric substrates.
- Fabricating amorphous-indium gallium zinc oxide (a-IGZO) based TFTs and circuits on these wrinkled surfaces.
- Characterizing device performance under various bending and stretching conditions.
Main Results:
- Devices maintained full operation at bending radii as small as 13 μm and stretching up to 5%.
- Electrical properties remained unchanged after mechanical deformation.
- Transparent TFTs exhibited comparable performance to non-transparent counterparts.
- A flexible rectifier showed no performance degradation when wrapped around an artificial wrist.
Conclusions:
- The buckling-induced wrinkling approach offers a scalable method for fabricating high-performance flexible and stretchable electronics.
- This technique holds promise for advanced wireless stretchable electronics for wearable and implantable applications.
