Directed Assembly of p-Type Tellurium Nanowires for Room-Temperature-Processed Thin-Film Transistors

The flexible electronics domain has emerged as an alternate technology beyond silicon CMOS because of advancements in low-temperature solution-processable thin film transistors (TFTs) and circuits. However, uniformity and scalability remain the main hindrances for solution-processed devices, especially when it comes to the deposition of nanomaterials. In this regard, directional assembly using dielectrophoresis is a quick and easy way to uniformly align 1-dimensional nanostructures, for example, nanowires, to bridge a gap between the electrodes to form a transistor channel using non-linear AC electric fields. In this study, high-hole mobility tellurium nanowires are assembled using non-linear AC dielectrophoresis to fabricate electrolyte-gated thin film transistors (EG-TFTs) on a flexible substrate at room temperature. These <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">p</i> -type flexible transistors exhibit an On-Off ratio of 3.3×10 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> , an On-current density of 20 μA μm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-1</sup> , a specific transconductance of 8.5 μS μm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-1</sup> and linear mobility of 20.6 cm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> V <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-1</sup> s <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-1</sup> with adequate mechanical strain tolerance.