Novel Semiconducting Quinone for Air-Stable n-Type Organic Field-Effect Transistors

Quinones are promising moieties for n-type organic semiconductors due to their high electron affinity. Benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b′]dithiophene-4,8-dione derivative with a quinone moiety have been synthesized, characterized, and used as active layer of organic field-effect transistors (OFETs). This derivative has deep LUMO level, leading to efficient charge-carrier injection and air stability. In addition, it forms a columnar structure with efficient intermolecular π−π and horizontal direction interactions, leading to high electron mobilities. In fact, OFET devices fabricated here showed good n-type characteristics, where the electron mobility was 0.15 cm2 V−1 s−1 under vacuum conditions and above 0.1 cm2 V−1 s−1 in air.