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Investigation of the inherent field-driven charge transport behaviour of three-dimensional lead halide perovskites has largely remained challenging, owing to undesirable ionic migration effects near room temperature and dipolar disorder instabilities prevalent specifically in methylammonium-and-lead-based high-performing three-dimensional perovskite compositions. Here, we address both these challenges and demonstrate that field-effect transistors based on methylammonium-free, mixed metal (Pb/Sn) perovskite compositions do not suffer from ion migration effects as notably as their pure-Pb counterparts and reliably exhibit hysteresis-free p-type transport with a mobility reaching 5.4 cm2 V-1 s-1. The reduced ion migration is visualized through photoluminescence microscopy under bias and is manifested as an activated temperature dependence of the field-effect mobility with a low activation energy (~48 meV) consistent with the presence of the shallow defects present in these materials. An understanding of the long-range electronic charge transport in these inherently doped mixed metal halide perovskites will contribute immensely towards high-performance optoelectronic devices.

Organometal halide perovskite semiconductors could potentially be used to create field-effect transistors (FETs) with high carrier mobilities. However, the performance of these transistors is currently limited by the migration of ionic surface defects. Here, we show that a surface cleaning and passivation technique, which is based on a sequence of three solution-based steps, can reduce the concentration of ionic surface defects in halide-based perovskites without perturbing the crystal lattice. The approach consists of an initial cleaning step using a polar/nonpolar solvent, a healing step to remove surface organic halide vacancies and a second cleaning step. The surface treatment is shown to restore clean, near hysteresis-free transistor operation, even if the perovskite films are formed under non-optimized conditions, and can improve room-temperature FET mobility by two to three orders of magnitude compared to untreated films. Our methylammonium lead iodide (MAPbI3) FETs exhibit high n- and p-type mobilities of 3.0 cm2 V−1 s−1 and 1.8 cm2 V−1 s−1, respectively, at 300 K, and higher values (9.2 cm2 V−1 s−1; n-type) at 80 K. We also show that the approach can be used to transform PbI2 single crystals into high-quality, two-dimensional perovskite single crystals. A three-stage solution-based cleaning technique can increase the room-temperature mobility and reduce the hysteresis of organometal halide perovskite transistors by decreasing the surface defects in the perovskite films.

Polymeric semiconductors exhibit exceptionally long spin lifetimes, and recently observed micrometre spin diffusion lengths in conjugated polymers demonstrate the potential for organic spintronics devices. Weak spin–orbit and hyperfine interactions lie at the origin of their long spin lifetimes, but the coupling mechanism of a spin to its environment remains elusive. Here, we present a systematic study of polaron spin lifetimes in field-effect transistors with high-mobility conjugated polymers as an active layer. We demonstrate how spin relaxation is governed by the charges’ hopping motion at low temperatures, whereas an Elliott–Yafet-like relaxation due to a transient localization of the carrier wavefunctions is responsible for spin relaxation at high temperatures. In this regime, charge, spin and structural dynamics are intimately related and depend sensitively on the local conformation of polymer backbones and the crystalline packing of the polymer chains. The long spin lifetimes observed in polymeric semiconductors hold promise for potential applications. A careful study untangles the main mechanism behind them.

Due to their low-temperature processing properties and inherent mechanical flexibility, conjugated polymer field-effect transistors (FETs) are promising candidates for enabling flexible electronic circuits and displays. Much progress has been made on materials performance; however, there remain significant concerns about operational and environmental stability, particularly in the context of applications that require a very high level of threshold voltage stability, such as active-matrix addressing of organic light-emitting diode displays. Here, we investigate the physical mechanisms behind operational and environmental degradation of high-mobility, p-type polymer FETs and demonstrate an effective route to improve device stability. We show that water incorporated in nanometre-sized voids within the polymer microstructure is the key factor in charge trapping and device degradation. By inserting molecular additives that displace water from these voids, it is possible to increase the stability as well as uniformity to a high level sufficient for demanding industrial applications.\ud \ud

The original version of this Article contained an error in the spelling of the author Dan Credgington, which was incorrectly given as Dan Credington. This has now been corrected in both the PDF and HTML versions of the Article.

Organometal halide perovskites (OHP) are promising materials for low-cost, high-efficiency light-emitting diodes. In films with a distribution of two-dimensional OHP nanosheets and small three-dimensional nanocrystals, an energy funnel can be realized that concentrates the excitations in highly efficient radiative recombination centers. However, this energy funnel is likely to contain inefficient pathways as the size distribution of nanocrystals, the phase separation between the OHP and the organic phase. Here, we demonstrate that the OHP crystallite distribution and phase separation can be precisely controlled by adding a molecule that suppresses crystallization of the organic phase. We use these improved material properties to achieve OHP light-emitting diodes with an external quantum efficiency of 15.5%. Our results demonstrate that through the addition of judiciously selected molecular additives, sufficient carrier confinement with first-order recombination characteristics, and efficient suppression of non-radiative recombination can be achieved while retaining efficient charge transport characteristics.

The development of semicrystalline polymer semiconductors with field-effect mobilities comparable to or even exceeding those of amorphous silicon has exposed limitations of describing charge transport in these materials with disorder-based models developed originally for more disordered, lower mobility polymers. Here, we show that the charge carrier density and temperature dependence of the field-effect electron mobility and Seebeck coefficient in the semicrystalline polymer P(NDI2OD-T2) with varying degrees of crystallinity are incompatible with a description of charge transport being limited by energetic disorder effects. We provide instead direct evidence of low disorder, narrow band conduction. A spatially inhomogeneous density of states and the inclusion of short range electron–electron interactions allow to consistently explain both the measured mobility and Seebeck coefficient. These results provide a rationale for improving thermoelectric efficiency of polymer semiconductors via increasing the extension of the crystalline domains. In order to develop the next generation of semiconductor devices it is important to better understand the fundamental physics of materials other than silicon. The authors develop a theoretical approach to describe the charge transport properties of polymer-based semiconductors by focusing on features related to their crystallographic properties.

The transport and relaxation mechanisms in organic semiconductors are still insufficiently understood, but measurements now show that in these materials polarons carry pure spin currents over extended distances with long relaxation times, and uncover the role of spin-orbit coupling in this process.

Owing to a technical error, the ‘Published online’ date of this Article originally mistakenly appeared as ‘15 March 2019’, but should have been ‘18 March 2019’.

Conjugated polymers and small organic molecules are enabling new, flexible, large-area, low-cost optoelectronic devices, such as organic light-emitting diodes, transistors and solar cells. Owing to their exceptionally long spin lifetimes, these carbon-based materials could also have an important impact on spintronics, where carrier spins play a key role in transmitting, processing and storing information. However, to exploit this potential, a method for direct conversion of spin information into an electric signal is indispensable. Here we show that a pure spin current can be produced in a solution-processed conducting polymer by pumping spins through a ferromagnetic resonance in an adjacent magnetic insulator, and that this generates an electric voltage across the polymer film. We demonstrate that the experimental characteristics of the generated voltage are consistent with it being generated through an inverse spin Hall effect in the conducting polymer. In contrast with inorganic materials, the conducting polymer exhibits coexistence of high spin-current to charge-current conversion efficiency and long spin lifetimes. Our discovery opens a route for a new generation of molecular-structure-engineered spintronic devices, which could lead to important advances in plastic spintronics.

Coupling between conduction electrons and localized magnetization is responsible for a variety of phenomena in spintronic devices. This coupling enables to generate spin currents from dynamical magnetization. Due to the nonlinearity of magnetization dynamics, the spin-current emission through the dynamical spin-exchange coupling offers a route for nonlinear generation of spin currents. Here, we demonstrate spin-current emission governed by nonlinear magnetization dynamics in a metal/magnetic insulator bilayer. The spin-current emission from the magnetic insulator is probed by the inverse spin Hall effect, which demonstrates nontrivial temperature and excitation power dependences of the voltage generation. The experimental results reveal that nonlinear magnetization dynamics and enhanced spin-current emission due to magnon scatterings are triggered by decreasing temperature. This result illustrates the crucial role of the nonlinear magnon interactions in the spin-current emission driven by dynamical magnetization, or nonequilibrium magnons, from magnetic insulators.

Spatial control of the recombination zone in an ambipolar light-emitting organic transistor

Organic semiconductors have been the subject of active research for over a decade now, with applications emerging in light-emitting displays and printable electronic circuits. One characteristic feature of these materials is the strong trapping of electrons but not holes: organic field-effect transistors (FETs) typically show p-type, but not n-type, conduction even with the appropriate low-work-function electrodes, except for a few special high-electron-affinity or low-bandgap organic semiconductors. Here we demonstrate that the use of an appropriate hydroxyl-free gate dielectric--such as a divinyltetramethylsiloxane-bis(benzocyclobutene) derivative (BCB; ref. 6)--can yield n-channel FET conduction in most conjugated polymers. The FET electron mobilities thus obtained reveal that electrons are considerably more mobile in these materials than previously thought. Electron mobilities of the order of 10(-3) to 10(-2) cm(2) V(-1) s(-1) have been measured in a number of polyfluorene copolymers and in a dialkyl-substituted poly(p-phenylenevinylene), all in the unaligned state. We further show that the reason why n-type behaviour has previously been so elusive is the trapping of electrons at the semiconductor-dielectric interface by hydroxyl groups, present in the form of silanols in the case of the commonly used SiO2 dielectric. These findings should therefore open up new opportunities for organic complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) circuits, in which both p-type and n-type behaviours are harnessed.

We present a process for manufacturing printable thin-film transistors (TFTs) that is based on solution processing and direct inkjet printing of polymer semiconductors, dielectrics, and conductors, as well as inorganic nanoparticle conductors. We show that the high device yield, uniformity, and resolution required for thin-film electronic applications can be achieved by using a substrate that contains a surface energy pattern to control the flow and spreading of inkjet droplets. This technique overcomes many of the limitations of current inkjet printing technology related to its limited droplet placement accuracy. We demonstrate the potential of this printing-based TFT manufacturing process with the fabrication of 50 dpi active-matrix, polymer dispersed liquid-crystal and Gyricon Smartpaper electronic paper displays.

Impressive advances in vapor-phase deposition and photolithographic patterning techniques have been fueling the silicon microelectronics revolution over the last 40 years. However, for many interesting classes of materials, including biological materials or functional synthetic polymers, vacuum deposition and photolithography are not the techniques of choice for producing ordered structures and devices. Many of these materials selfassemble into well-ordered microstructures when deposited from solution, and patterning may be more readily achieved by solution-based selective deposition and direct-printing techniques. It is appealing to consider novel ways of manufacturing functional circuits and devices based on techniques that are similar to printing visual information onto paper.

Many of the remarkable electrical and optical properties of organic semiconductors are governed by the interaction of electronic excitations with intra- and intermolecular vibrational modes. However, in specific systems this interaction is not understood in detail at a molecular level and this has been due, at least in part, to the lack of easy-to-use and widely available experimental probes of the structural dynamics. Here we demonstrate that thermal diffuse scattering in electron diffraction patterns from organic semiconductors, such as 6,13-bistriisopropyl-silylethynyl pentacene, allows the dominant lattice vibrational modes to be probed directly. The amplitude and direction of the dominant molecular motions were determined by comparison of the diffuse scattering with simulations and molecular dynamics calculations. Our widely applicable approach enables a much deeper understanding of the structural dynamics in a broad range of organic semiconductors.

Organic semiconductors that operate through the conduction of positive charges are the first choice for use in printable electronic circuitry. A device that uses electrons instead has just joined the rankings. Printed electronics devices show great potential for cheap consumer and health-care products and new applications are rapidly emerging. But device applications are limited by the fact that the plastic semiconductors currently available are almost exclusively 'hole-transporting' materials that operate via the conduction of positive charges. If an electron-transporting equivalent can be found — retaining good electrical transport properties, chemical stability and ease of processing — then it would be possible to use it in tandem with the existing plastic semiconductors to produce yet more powerful devices. Such combinations are known as 'complementary' circuitry. A team working at the Polyera Corporation labs in the United States and at BASF in Germany has produced a new material that achieves that goal. It is a highly soluble electron-transporting plastic semiconductor that exhibits unprecedented device performance, and is compatible with a broad range of printing and processing technologies.

A solution to the thin film silicon transistor gate metallization problem in active matrix liquid crystal displays is demonstrated in the form of a self-passivation process for copper. Bottom-level copper (Cu) lines are passivated by a self-aligned CrOx encapsulation formed by surface segregation of chromium (Cr) from dilute Cu1-xCrx alloys (x=0.1–2.3) at 400°C. The encapsulation is an efficient barrier for Cu diffusion into the SiNx gate insulator during the plasma deposition and transistor processing, and solves the problems of oxidation and adhesion to the glass substrate. Gate line resistivities are 4.5 to 7.5μΩcm depending on the initial Cr concentration. The performance of self-passivated Cu-gate thin film transistors is comparable to that of transistors with refractory metal gates.

Until now, organic semiconductors, such as pentacene, have only allowed the flow of one type of charge. A new study confirms that — like their inorganic counterparts — both positive and negative charges can flow in the same material.

We discuss the properties of semiconducting iron silicides, grown epitaxially on Si(001) and Si(111) by molecular beam epitaxy. The growth on Si (111) involves phase transitions from epitaxially stabilized metallic phases, leading to larger epitaxial β-FeSi2 grains than most other deposition procedures. The structural and electric properties of β-FeSi2/Si(001) are improved considerably for growth temperatures above 650 °C. Hall mobilities of p—conducting films reach values up to 600 cm2/Vsec at 100 K, at carrier densities below 1017 cm−3. Despite of the high majority carrier mobility and low carrier density, the photoelectric response of p-β-FeSi2/n-Si(001) diodes does not yield any significant contribution from the silicide, however, in accordance with the expected band structure diagram.

The first magneto—transport data taken on thin pseudomorphic FeSi films with the CsCl structure are presented. FeSi appears to be a Kondo system with a Kondo temperature of TK ∼ 15 K. On air-exposed films which have not been protected by a Si-cap an ultrathin magnetic oxide is formed leading to large anomalies in the Hall effect and the magnetoresistance as the film thickness approaches 20 Å.

Pseudomorphic Fe1-x Si films have been grown on Si(111) by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) at room temperature (RT). Structural investigations revealed that the phase crystallizes in the cubic CsCl structure with a lattice constant close to half that of Si. Upon annealing, films thicker than 15Å undergo a phase transition to the stable bulk ε-FeSi, either in epitaxial or in polycrystalline form at temperatures around 300°C. Thinner films do not transform to the ε-FeSi phase. Instead they exhibit a continuous increase of the Si content up to the stoichiometry of FeSi2 The CsCl symmetry persists, exept for prolonged annealing close to the transition to βFeSi2, where γ-FeSi2 (CaF2 ) forms as an intermediate phase.

Epitaxial single-domain CoSi2(100) layers were grown on Si(100) by use of a template technique. In-situ scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) and reflection high energy electron diffraction (RHEED) were used for a detailed surface study. The (√2×√2)R45 reconstruction of the Co-rich “C-surface” and the (3√2×√2)R45 as well as a newly discovered (√2×√2)R45 of the Si-rich “S-surface” were resolved in real space and are discussed in detail. The transition from the C- to the S-surface above 500 °C is related to a (2×2) reconstruction.

Nature Nanotechnology 2, 784–789 (2007). In figure 2d, the units for the drain current were incorrectly given in amperes (A). The correct units should be microamperes (μA).