Organic Electronics – where are we, where do we go? Abstract

Organic semiconductors with conjugated electron system are currently being intensively investigated since they offer the possibility for novel, flexible, low-cost, ubiquitous electronics. Possible applications are for logic and memory devices and for optoelectronic devices such as organic light-emitting diodes (OLED) and organic solar cells.

In this talk I will discuss recent progress in this field. First I will discuss basic properties of organic semiconductors, leading to differences to inorganic semiconductors related to the molecular structure of organic semiconductors. The main effect is that mobilities are many orders of magnitude below silicon or GaAs. Second, I will discuss device applications. For logic devices, a real breakthrough of organic electronics has not been achieved, partly due to the fact that the low mobility has limited organics to low-performance applications. For optoelectronic devices, however, organics have been a great success: Displays based on organic LED are already a multibillion market. OLEDs for lighting applications have also entered the market. Organic solar cells have recently made much progress and have passed the 10% efficiency limit, but need further advances.