Abstract
The threshold voltage modulation of carbon nanotube thin-film transistors (TFTs) and flexible three-dimensional (3D) integration circuits has become hot research topics for carbon-based electronics. In this paper, a doping-free gate electrode technology is introduced to significantly modulate the threshold voltage of polymer-sorted semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotube (sc-SWCNT) TFTs in combination with the highly effective gate-controlling ability of solid-state electrolyte thin films as the dielectrics. A systematic investigation was conducted on the impact of printed silver, evaporated silver, and evaporated aluminum (Al) gate electrodes on the threshold voltage of flexible printed bottom-gate and top-gate SWCNT TFTs. The results indicate that the SWCNT TFTs with Al gate electrodes exhibit enhancement-mode characteristics with excellent electrical properties, such as the negative threshold voltages (−0.6 V), high Ion/Ioff (up to 106), low subthreshold swing (61.4 mV · dec−1), and small hysteresis. It is attributed to either the formation of lower work function thin films (Al2O3) at the electrode/dielectric layer interfaces through the natural oxidation of the Al bottom-gate electrodes or the dipole reaction of the Al top-gate electrodes from X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy (UPS) data. In addition, 3D complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) inverters with common gate electrodes were constructed using the resulting enhancement-mode P-type SWCNT TFTs and matched N-type SWCNT TFTs, which shows high voltage gain (34), rail-to-rail output and high noise margins (80.04%, VDD = −1 V) as well good mechanical flexibility at low operation voltages. It demonstrates that SWCNT TFTs have great advantages for building large-scale 3D flexible integrated circuits.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2020YFA0714700), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 62274174, 12274073), Key Research and Development Program of Jiangsu Province (Grant No. BK20232009), and Cooperation Project of Vacuum Interconnect Research Facility (NANO-X) of Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. F2208). The authors are grateful for the technical support for Nano-X of Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences.
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Chen, Z., Li, J., Li, M. et al. Flexible printed three dimensional (3D) integrated carbon nanotube complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) thin film transistors and circuits. Sci. China Inf. Sci. 67, 192401 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11432-023-3933-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11432-023-3933-7