Designing Organic Semiconductors for Transistors

Speaker

Iain McCulloch

• Director of the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment
• Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Princeton University

About this Talk

This presentation will discuss current understanding of the molecular design features responsible for optimizing charge transport in organic semiconducting polymers. Organic semiconducting polymers have been shown to be promising candidates to enable high charge carrier mobility in organic thin film transistors, which can find use in flexible displays and other electronic applications. Iain McCulloch will examine the molecular features responsible for the high charge carrier mobility of the indacenodithiophene-co-benzothiadiazole copolymer, a benchmark semiconducting polymer employed in organic transistors. This will involve highlighting the influence of conformational coplanarity and side-chain assisted self-assembly to create efficient one-dimensional transport along conjugated polymer backbones, with sterically free “crossing points” allowing interchain hopping. Understanding the impact of both the organic semiconducting polymer design and processing conditions, on both molecular conformation and thin film microstructure, has been demonstrated to be essential in achieving the optimal transport properties.

About the Speaker

Iain McCulloch is the director of the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment and a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Princeton University, as well as holding a visiting professor position in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Oxford. He previously held joint appointments as Professor of Chemical Science and Director of KAUST Solar Center at KAUST, as well as a Chair in Polymer Materials in the Chemistry Department at Imperial College.  Before joining academia, he spent 18 years managing industrial research groups at Hoechst in the US and Merck in the UK. He is a fellow of the Royal Society, the Royal Society of Chemistry, the European Academy of Sciences, and a Member of Academia Europaea. He is the recipient of the 2022 Royal Society Armourers and Brasiers Prize, the 2020 Blaise Pascal Medal for Materials Science, the Royal Society of Chemistry 2020 Interdisciplinary Prize, 2014 Tilden Medal for Advances in Chemistry and the 2009 Creativity in Industry Prize. His interests are in the design and investigation of organic semiconducting materials.

About the MSE Seminar Series

The Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) Seminar Series features distinguished speakers from leading institutions, offering a platform for sharing groundbreaking research, innovative ideas, and entrepreneurial experiences. Held multiple times each semester, these seminars bring global perspectives world to MIT’s materials research community, exposing students, faculty, and postdocs to cutting-edge concepts and valuable networking opportunities.