Megahertz operation of flexible low-voltage organic thin-film transistors

Bottom-gate, top-contact (inverted staggered) organic thin-film transistors with a channel length of 1 μm have been fabricated on flexible plastic substrates using the vacuum-deposited small-molecule semiconductor 2,9-didecyl-dinaphtho[2,3-b:2′,3′-f]thieno[3,2-b]thiophene (C ₁₀-DNTT). The transistors have an effective field-effect mobility of 1.2 cm²/V s, an on/off ratio of 10⁷, a width-normalized transconductance of 1.2 S/m (with a standard deviation of 6%), and a signal propagation delay (measured in 11-stage ring oscillators) of 420 ns per stage at a supply voltage of 3 V. To our knowledge, this is the first time that megahertz operation has been achieved in flexible organic transistors at supply voltages of less than 10 V.