Exploiting Collective Effects of Multiple Optoelectronic Devices Integrated in a Single Fiber

Abstract

The opportunities and challenges of realizing sophisticated functionality by assembling many nanoscale devices, while covering large areas, remain for the most part unrealized and unresolved. In this work, we demonstrate the successful fabrication of an eight-device cascaded optoelectronic fiber structure in which components down to 100 nm are individually electrically addressed and can operate collectively to deliver novel functionality over large area coverage. We show that a tandem arrangement of subwavelength photodetecting devices integrated in a single fiber enables the extraction of information on the direction, wavelength, and potentially even color of incident radiation over a wide spectral range in the visible regime. Finally, we fabricated a 0.1 square meter single plane fiber assembly which uses polychromatic illumination to extract images without the use of a lens, representing an important step toward ambient light imaging fabrics.

Fiber Field‐Effect Device Via In Situ Channel Crystallization

“…[ 2 ] Glassy chalcogenide compounds have been shown to codraw with metals and polymeric insulators into tens-of-meterslong, light-weight and fl exible fi bers with unusual functionalities. [3][4][5][6][7] To date, however, these multimaterial fi bers exhibit limited electrical performance due to the use of thermally stable glassy semiconductors. Indeed, amorphous materials exhibit a continuous change in viscosity with respect to the temperature between the solid and liquid states necessary for thermal drawing, but this disordered state also results in high densities of electronic defects and poor electrical properties.…”

Controlled Sub‐Micrometer Hierarchical Textures Engineered in Polymeric Fibers and Microchannels via Thermal Drawing

“…[1][2][3] Such advanced multimaterial fiber systems have been proposed for applications, in optics [16][17][18][19] and imaging, [20][21][22] optoelectronics, [23][24][25][26] sensing, [27,28] energy harvesting, [29,30] bioengineering, [31,32] health care or smart textiles. [21,33,34] So far however, the use of micro-and sub-micrometer surface textures to impart fibers with novel functionalities has not been exploited. The texturing of materials is used in a myriad of applications to tailor surface properties and provide novel or improved functionalities.…”

Hybrid Optical Fibers – An Innovative Platform for In‐Fiber Photonic Devices

“…Integrating semiconducting functionalities, traditionally reserved for smaller scale and rigid wafer substrates, inside fl exible 1D systems with the length and surface associated with optical fi bers, can herald a novel path towards large area, fl exible, and even wearable optoelectronic devices. Several applications can be envisioned and have been proposed for these one dimensional fi ber systems (as opposed to point devices) in imaging, [ 41,103,104 ] industrial monitoring, [ 105 ] remote and distributed sensing, [ 34,35 ] energy harvesting [ 75,106 ] and functional fabrics. [ 25,41,107 ] A promising strategy to realize this vision is to employ the multimaterial thermal drawing approach to directly integrate semiconducting materials in contact with metals and insulators in prescribed architectures.…”

“…Assembling such photodetecting fi bers into a fl exible grid, the Fink group at MIT could demonstrate a fi berbased fabric capable of generating optical images. [ 41,104 ] This fi rst generation of optoelectronic fi bers has given rise to new 1D devices that can be integrated in myriad of applications and confi gurations. The examples presented so far still suffer, however, from three main limitations: 1) the axial symmetry that prevents the extraction of information on the stimuli distribution along the fi ber axis; 2) the amorphous nature of the semiconducting material that result in rather poor optoelectronic properties, and; 3) the limited available semiconducting materials.…”

“…Adapted with permission. [ 41 ] 1) Crystalline semiconductor phases inside the fi ber can be established when subjected to a specifi c post-drawing heat treatment. [ 119,120 ] One example includes crystallites that have grown from the tin electrodes interfacing with a chalcogenide glass (As 52 Se 40 Te 8 ) after a post-drawing annealing treatment ( Figure 14 a).…”