Sorting of large-diameter semiconducting carbon nanotube and printed flexible driving circuit for organic light emitting diode (OLED)Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available. See DOI: 10.1039/c3nr04870e

• Main Authors: Xu, Wenya, Zhao, Jianwen, Qian, Long, Han, Xianying, Wu, Liangzhuan, Wu, Weichen, Song, Minshun, Zhou, Lu, Su, Wenming, Wang, Chao, Nie, Shuhong, Cui, Zheng
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 16.01.2014
• ISSN: 2040-3364; 2040-3372
• DOI: 10.1039/c3nr04870e

A novel approach was developed to sort a large-diameter semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotube (sc-SWCNT) based on copolyfluorene derivative with high yield. High purity sc-SWCNTs inks were obtained by wrapping arc-discharge SWCNTs with poly[2,7-(9,9-dioctylfluorene)-alt-4,7-bis(thiophen-2-yl)benzo-2,1,3-thiadiazole] (PFO-DBT) aided by sonication and centrifugation in tetrahydrofuran (THF). The sorted sc-SWCNT inks and nanosilver inks were used to print top-gated thin-film transistors (TFTs) on flexible substrates with an aerosol jet printer. The printed TFTs demonstrated low operating voltage, small hysteresis, high on-state current (up to 10 −3 A), high mobility and on-off ratio. An organic light emitting diode (OLED) driving circuit was constructed based on the printed TFTs, which exhibited high on-off ratio up to 10 4 and output current up to 3.5 × 10 −4 A at V scan = −4.5 V and V dd = 0.8 V. A single OLED was switched on with the driving circuit, showing the potential as backplanes for active matrix OLED applications. Printed, flexible OLED driving circuits based on sorted sc-SWCNTs show the ability to control external OLED lighting.