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Poly(3-hexylthio) thiophene Field-effect Transistor Device Performance: Impact of the Content of Hexylthio Side Chain on Backbone

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Abstract

Regioregular poly(3-hexylthio)thiopene (P3HTT) has emerged tremendous potential in organic electronic applications due to the strong noncovalent interactions from the sulfur atom linked to thiophene. However, P3HTT generally exhibits low charge mobility mostly due to poor solution processability attributed to dense arrangement of hexylthio side chain in polymer, which led to strong noncovalent interactions among sulfur atoms. To balance the nonvalent interaction and aggregation for P3HTT, herein, we systematically study the effect of hexylthio side chain content in polymer backbone on the structure and properties. A series of regioregular P3HTT-based homopolymers (P3HTT, P3HTT-50, P3HTT-33 and P3HTT-25) were prepared via Kumada catalyst transfer polycondensation method from a set of mono-, bi-, ter- and quarter-thiophenes containing different contents of hexylthio side chain. The DFT calculation shows the planarity of polymers backbone could be improved through reducing the density of hexylthio side chain in polymer mainchain. And significant changes in their crystallinity, aggregation and optical properties were observed with the content of hexylthio side chain reducing. The P3HTT-33 displayed the highest field-effect transistor hole mobility of 2.83×10−2 cm2·V−1·s−1 resulting from a balance between the crystallinity and planarity. This study demonstrates modulating the content of hexylthio side chain in P3HTT is an effective strategy to optimize the opto-electronic properties of polymer obtaining excellent semiconductor device performance.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financially supported by the Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (No. 20JC1414900), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 52203005) and the Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (No. 21ZR1401400).

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  1. State Key Laboratory for Modification of Chemical Fibers and Polymer Materials, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Donghua University, Shanghai, 201620, China

    Hao-Yu Liu, Lian-He Han, Li-Ping Zhu, Xiao-Lan Qiao & Mei-Fang Zhu

  2. School of Electronic Information and Electrical Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, 200240, China

    Ling-Wei Kong

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Mei-Fang Zhu is an editorial board member for Chinese Journal of Polymer Science and was not involved in the editorial review or the decision to publish this article. All authors declare that there are no competing interests.

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Poly(3-hexylthio) thiophene Field-effect Transistor Device Performance: Impact of the Content of Hexylthio Side Chain on Backbone

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Liu, HY., Han, LH., Kong, LW. et al. Poly(3-hexylthio) thiophene Field-effect Transistor Device Performance: Impact of the Content of Hexylthio Side Chain on Backbone. Chin J Polym Sci 42, 14–23 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10118-023-3042-z

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