УДК 621.382
COMPARATIVE APPROACH TO ORGANIC ELECTRONICS
R.I.Shuvalov
Language supervisor - N.O.Kuznetsova
Siberian Federal University
Currently the world of electronic devices is growing rapidly. One of the most
promising areas is organic electronics. In this article, we define what organic electronics is,
consider the historical facts of its origin, and analyze its merits and demerits in comparison
with the existing electronic technology.
The initial discovery of technologies to produce electronic plastics-based components
took place in the late 1970s. Chemists Alan J. Heeger, Alan MacDiarmid and Hideki
Shirakawa published their findings which showed that the modified polyacetylene halogens
can conduct electricity almost as well as metal. This discovery and other basic researches in
the field of organic polymers contributed to the development of organic electronics, which
combines the developments in solid-state physics and molecular physics, organic and
inorganic chemistry and material sciences, electronics and printed matter. In 2000 the
founders of the breakthrough directions received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for his
discovery of conductivity in polymers."
Organic electronics is a new technology that will produce thin and flexible device.
Electronic devices and components can be printed on the printer, if the ink is made of
materials with carbon compounds. So it is possible to produce the whole range of electrical
and electronic components chips - from transistors, memory and battery to processors, sensors
and displays, light emitting polymers printed on plastic, metal or paper films. This «smart»
packaging, lighting OLED - OLED, cheap electronic RFID tags RFID, curl up into roll
displays, flexible solar cells, disposable devices for diagnosis, flexible touch screens, printed
batteries, transistors and memory devices.
Organic electronics will improve the polymer properties inherent to conventional
inorganic semiconductors. Organic polymers components can be used to apply solar cells,
light-emitting diodes and thin-film transistors.
Polymeric materials have always been associated with revolutionary changes in
science and technology. They have long and successfully replaced traditional insulation
materials. The variety of polymer compositions and the ability to obtain materials through a
wide range of physical and chemical properties have led to their successful use in
microelectronics and electrical engineering as a structural material. Conducting polymers are
widely used to manufacture electrodes of chemically powerful sources, voltage stabilizers,
electrolyte capacitors, to automatically control temperatureetc. The discovery and the study of
the photoconductivity effect led to the formation of photodetectors based on them. The high
«sensitivity» of the spectral characteristics of the polymers to the original structure and the
polymer component made it possible to create devices with a wide spectral range. But the
scientists do not stop. Nowadays modified polymers with properties of conductivity are being
intensively sought, compositions with nonlinear characteristics in field effects are being
developed. The success of these studies may lead to the improvement of the main components
of electronic equipment.
Using physical principles and technology of «plastic electronics» makes the first
natural step towards molecular electronics. The fact is that in the classical solid-state
electronics the properties of a crystalline body and active structures are formed in its
entirety, while the polymer application takes into account molecule properties. Thus the
transition to the molecular electronics is based on an active element with a single module. The
problem is faced by scientists - the choice of technological point (local) method effects of
changes in the molecule and its primary chemical structure.
Another problem of «plastic electronics» is quite a low speed (just several hundred
hertz) and high operating voltage (hundreds of volts).Consequently, computing devices based
on them would be of very low productivity and high energy consumption. However experts
are working on this, in particular, the team of professor Henning Sirringausa from the
University of Cambridge managed to achieve a breakthrough in solving this problem. They
created an organic chip that runs at hundreds of kilohertz, and its power is a sufficient 9-volt
battery. The secret is a new organic material, which greatly simplifies the technical process.
The problem is that the chips need to be printed in two dissimilar active materials, and a
substance formed by them has just ambipolar properties. Now the new plastic schemes cannot
yet be used in high-power computing devices, but they will create a number of exciting new
products that will be cheap, easy to manufacture and easy to use.
Inorganic electronics provides high order layers and transitions, which cannot be
ensured by organic and polymeric materials. But organic electronics has advantages over
inorganic, which is gradually coming to its physical limits. Compared to the production of
silicon electronics it is much cheaper in the long term (the cost of the equipment is ten times
lower than in the microelectronics industry), environmentally-friendly production (printing
technologies) of organic elements, their universal qualities such as light weight, flexibility,
transparency, long shelf life and reliability, the ability to print many components of electronic
devices simultaneously. It is not necessary to use expensive vacuum processes. The main
advantage of organic electronics is that the ink jet printer on a roll, gravure printing or other
means are applied in all the components of the roll motion and the rate can reach 10 meters
per minute. This indicates a high performance and low cost. One can quickly and cheaply
implement any idea of the circuit, first perform it on the computer and then print on the
substrate.
Thus, electronics is on the verge of «polymer revolution». In the coming years it will
be possible to print electronic products. They will create full color screens and displays, solar
cells and light panels on the white LED, electronic paper, and more. New electronic products
based on polymer materials, which will appear in the near future, will dramatically change the
conditions of electronic equipment application, will enhance the ability of information
technology. Nowadays they are creating preconditions of the coming transition to new
principles of business, lifestyle and entertainment.