SBIR Phase I: Nanocomposite Barrier Coatings for Organic Electronics

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This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will develop novel flexible, transparent and photocurable nanocomposite barrier coatings to prevent the degradation of conducting polymers by oxygen and water vapor. Conducting polymer electronic devices can be made rapidly, low-cost, flexible, lightweight and mechanically more robust than inorganic electronics; the main limitation to their wide-scale commercialization is the problem with degradation. The solution to this problem is to use a barrier layer to prevent oxygen and water vapor from reaching the conducting polymer. Current barrier coatings do not block oxygen and water permeation well enough to make long lifetime conducting polymer devices possible, and the need is especially great for flexible products such as roll-up displays. Nanocomposites, polymeric materials that contain inorganic particles smaller than 100 nm, have exceptional barrier properties and are ideally suited for display applications because the small size of the nanoparticles allows the composite to be transparent. This project will utilize nanoparticles in a photocurable urethane-acrylate coating system to prevent oxygen and water vapor from reaching the underlying conducting polymer.Coatings are needed to extend the lifetime of conducting polymer electronic devices including: flexible OLED (organic light emitting diode) displays, thin film transistors, new rapid scan chips used as bar-code replacements, printed electronic circuits and lightweight electronics.