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High-performance solution-processed polymer ferroelectric field-effect transistors

Nature Materials volume 4, pages 243–248 (2005)Cite this article

Abstract

We demonstrate a rewritable, non-volatile memory device with flexible plastic active layers deposited from solution. The memory device is a ferroelectric field-effect transistor (FeFET) made with a ferroelectric fluoropolymer and a bisalkoxy-substituted poly(p-phenylene vinylene) semiconductor material. The on- and off-state drain currents differ by several orders of magnitude, and have a long retention time, a high programming cycle endurance and short programming time. The remanent semiconductor surface charge density in the on-state has a high value of 18 mC m−2, which explains the large on/off ratio. Application of a moderate gate field raises the surface charge to 26 mC m−2, which is of a magnitude that is very difficult to obtain with conventional FETs because they are limited by dielectric breakdown of the gate insulator. In this way, the present ferroelectric–semiconductor interface extends the attainable field-effect band bending in organic semiconductors.

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Figure 1: Ferroelectric hysteresis loops of a P(VDF/TrFE) polymer capacitor device.
Figure 2: Transfer characteristics as a function of temperature of MEH-PPV FETs (symbols) and the modelling result (lines).
Figure 3: Hysteretic drain current as a function of gate voltage for polymer FeFETs.
Figure 4: Channel conductance G versus surface charge density ρ for a PTrFE FET, the model derived from it and the method of calculating the remanent ρ in a polymer FeFET.
Figure 5: Data retention time, programming cycle endurance and programming time measurements.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge financial support by the Dutch Science Foundation NWO/FOM and the Dutch Polymer Institute (project no. 276), and the EC (project PolyApply IST-IP-507143).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Materials Science Centre, University of Groningen, Nijenborgh 4, Groningen, 9747 AG, The Netherlands

    Ronald C. G. Naber, Cristina Tanase & Paul W. M. Blom

  2. Philips Research Laboratories, Professor Holstlaan 4, Eindhoven, 5656 AA, The Netherlands

    Gerwin H. Gelinck, Albert W. Marsman, Fred J. Touwslager, Sepas Setayesh & Dago M. de Leeuw

Authors
  1. Ronald C. G. Naber
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  2. Cristina Tanase
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  3. Paul W. M. Blom
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Correspondence to Ronald C. G. Naber.

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Naber, R., Tanase, C., Blom, P. et al. High-performance solution-processed polymer ferroelectric field-effect transistors. Nature Mater 4, 243–248 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat1329

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