Hysteresis reduction for organic thin film transistors with multiple stacked functional zirconia polymeric films

We show that transfer hysteresis for a pentacene thin film transistor (TFT) with a low-temperature solution-processed zirconia (ZrOx) gate insulator can be remarkably reduced by modifying the ZrOx surface with a thin layer of crosslinked poly(4-vinylphenol) (c-PVP). Pentacene TFTs with bare ZrOx and c-PVP stacked ZrOx gate insulators were fabricated, and their hysteresis behaviors compared. The different gate insulators exhibited no significant surface morphology or capacitance differences. The threshold voltage shift magnitude decreased by approximately 71% for the TFT with the c-PVP stacked ZrOx gate insulator compared with the bare ZrOx gate insulator, with 0.75 ± 0.05 and 0.22 ± 0.03 V threshold voltage shifts for the bare ZrOx and c-PVP stacked ZrOx gate insulators, respectively. The hysteresis reduction was attributed to effectively covering hysteresis-inducing charge trapping sites on ZrOx surfaces.