A flexible, scalable, and self-powered mid-infrared detector based on transparent PEDOT: PSS/graphene composite

A flexible, self-powered and semi-transparent mid-infrared photodetector is demonstrated with graphene and poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene): poly(4-styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT: PSS) composite on poly vinyl alcohol (PVA) substrate. The effective dispersion of graphene nanoplatelets within polymer chains has yielded a low requisite loading of graphene - only 3 wt% for the implement of a detector with optimized photo-thermoelectric effect, high flexibility and high transparency. Under a broadband infrared radiation with peak wavelength at 7.8 mu m, 1.4 x 10(7) cm Hz(1/2)W(-1) photo detectivity is achieved in composite detector, which is 22 times higher than pure PEDOT: PSS. The demonstrated detector array exhibits good optical transparency of 63% and is capable of being bent to a radius of 1 mm due to strong interaction between composite film and PVA substrate. These features make this scalable mid-infrared photodetector very promising as next-generation optoelectronics. (C) 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.