Toward Environmentally Robust Organic Electronics: Approaches and Applications

Abstract

Recent interest in flexible electronics has led to a paradigm shift in consumer electronics, and the emergent development of stretchable and wearable electronics is opening a new spectrum of ubiquitous applications for electronics. Organic electronic materials, such as π-conjugated small molecules and polymers, are highly suitable for use in low-cost wearable electronic devices, and their charge-carrier mobilities have now exceeded that of amorphous silicon. However, their commercialization is minimal, mainly because of weaknesses in terms of operational stability, long-term stability under ambient conditions, and chemical stability related to fabrication processes. Recently, however, many attempts have been made to overcome such instabilities of organic electronic materials. Here, an overview is provided of the strategies developed for environmentally robust organic electronics to overcome the detrimental effects of various critical factors such as oxygen, water, chemicals, heat, and light. Additionally, molecular design approaches to π-conjugated small molecules and polymers that are highly stable under ambient and harsh conditions are explored; such materials will circumvent the need for encapsulation and provide a greater degree of freedom using simple solution-based device-fabrication techniques. Applications that are made possible through these strategies are highlighted.

Sustainable Access to π-Conjugated Molecular Materials via Direct (Hetero)Arylation Reactions in Water and under Air

“…Researchers working in the field of printed (opto)electronics are becoming increasingly aware of the need for materials combining reasonable performances with sustainable synthetic access [10,11]. Such an endeavor requires a certain redirection in the design criteria guiding the development of new materials and a drastic improvement of the synthetic methodologies employed [12,13].…”

Organic Flexible Electronics

“…Additionally, stability and lifetime of flexible devices under ambient or even harsh conditions are critical to commercialization. Most organic semiconducting materials are vulnerable to some conditions such as the exposure to water, oxygen, heat, chemicals, and light irradiation . In addition to the optimization of molecular design and material syntheses, an efficient approach used thus far has been the adoption of an encapsulation layer to protect the final devices from extrinsic degradation sources.…”

Designing anisotropic microstructures with spectral density function

“…OPVCs are promising alternatives to traditional Silicon based solar cells due to several advantages lightweight, flexibility, low production cost, short payback period [25,26] etc. but, their largescale production and commercial usage has been plagued by problems of instability and batch to batch variability [27]. A typical OPVC shown in Fig (d) movement of charges to respective electrodes.…”