High performance amorphous metallated π-conjugated polymers for field-effect transistors and polymer solar cells

Solution-processible organic field-effect transistors (OFETs) and organic photovoltaics (OPVs) have been extensively investigated due to their potential for low cost, large area, and lightweight electronic and optoelectronic applications., One of the key enabling materials for OFETs and OPVs is,pi-conjugated semiconducting polymers with high charge carrier mobility and good processability. There are two approaches for the development of high-performance semiconducting polymers. The first one is to design materials with enhanced order through self-organization. The strong,pi-pi interactions in these polymers enables fast in-plane charge transport, leading to hole mobilities of 0.01 to 0.6 cm(2) V-1 s(-1).(2) However, the performance of these systems is strongly dependent on the post-treatments 3 and the structural regioregularity of the polymers, which increases the complexity for device processing. The alternative approach is to produce amorphous polymer thin films with a uniform path for charge transport. Charge carrier mobility in this system is usually lower than that of the polycrystalline polymers due to the lack of band transport. The best reported field-effect mobility for the amorphous system is 6.1 x 10(-3) cm(2) V-1 s(-1) from a large bandgap polytriarylamine derivative. Here we report the design and synthesis of a series of amorphous metallated pi-conjugated polymers that show field-effect hole mobility up to 1.0 x 10(-2) cm(2) V-1 s(-1). In addition, their small bandgap and high extinction coefficient properties enable them to be used for high-performance