Recent progress in organic antiambipolar transistor development: fundamentals and applications

Abstract

This paper briefly reviews recent progress in antiambipolar transistor (AAT) development. A variety of semiconducting materials, such as two-dimensional (2D) atomic layers, carbon nanotubes, and organic semiconductors (OSCs), have been employed as AAT channels thus far. Among these materials, we focus on the OSCs in this review, with emphasis on their advantages in terms of processability, scalability, and device designability, through comparison with their 2D counterparts. The uniqueness of AATs can be ascribed to their distinctive electrical properties: the Λ-shaped transfer curve and high potential for use in optoelectronic applications. First, the fundamental mechanism of the carrier transport is discussed in terms of the characteristic device configuration, the key element of which is the PN-heterojunction at the transistor channels. Then, we underline the importance of collective and systematic investigations through experiment and theoretical simulation. Second, the ATT applications are reviewed, including multivalued logic (MVL) circuits along with their optical responsivity and those on flexible substrates. Despite their various advantages, such as mechanical flexibility, light weight, solution processability, and cost-effectiveness, organic electronics have, until recently, been recognized to have weak points in terms of integration density and data processing capability, because of their incompatibility with conventional lithographic processes. However, organic AATs appear to offer means to overcome such weaknesses, and thereby open a new frontier in the field of organic electronics.