Importance of Blade-Coating Temperature for Diketopyrrolopyrrole-based Thin-Film Transistors

Abstract

In this work, the effect of blade-coating temperature on the electrical properties of a conjugated donor–acceptor copolymer containing diketopyrrolopyrrole (DPP)-based thin-film transistors (TFTs) was systematically analyzed. The organic semiconductor (OSC) layers were blade-coated at various blade-coating temperatures from room temperature (RT) to 80 °C. No remarkable changes were observed in the thickness, surface morphology, and roughness of the OSC films as the blade-coating temperature increased. DPP-based TFTs exhibited two noticeable tendencies in the magnitude of field-effect mobility with increasing blade-coating temperatures. As the temperature increased up to 40 °C, the field-effect mobility increased to 148% compared to the RT values. On the contrary, when the temperature was raised to 80 °C, the field-effect mobility significantly reduced to 20.9% of the mobility at 40 °C. These phenomena can be explained by changes in the crystallinity of DPP-based films. Therefore, the appropriate setting of the blade-coating temperature is essential in obtaining superior electrical characteristics for TFTs. A blade-coating temperature of 40 °C was found to be the optimum condition in terms of electrical performance for DPP-based TFTs.