Thieno[3,2- b]pyrrole and Benzo[ c][1,2,5]thiadiazole Donor-Acceptor Semiconductors for Organic Field-Effect Transistors

Abstract

Two p-type donor-acceptor (D-A) semiconducting small molecules were synthesized to investigate the effect of the backbone curvature on the organic field-effect transistor performance. The backbone curvature of the donor-acceptor small molecules was modified by changing the spacer group from bithiophene to thienothiophene. Bithiophene to thienothiophene spacer groups were placed between 4H-thieno[3,2-b]pyrrole (donor) and benzo[c][1,2,5]thiadiazole (acceptor) to generate TP-BT4T-TP and TP-BT2TT-TP donor-acceptor molecules. A good charge carrier mobility of 2.59 × 10-2 cm2 V-1 s-1 was measured for the curved molecule (TP-BT4T-TP), while the linear molecule analog (TP-BT2TT-TP) only gave a low mobility of 5.41 × 10-5 cm2 V-1 s-1 after annealing at 120 °C in bottom-contact bottom-gate devices. Out-of-plane grazing-incidence X-ray diffraction analysis revealed more drastic thermally induced crystallinity for TP-BT4T-TP as compared to TP-BT2TT-TP, explaining the difference observed in the performance of devices fabricated from each molecule.