PFI-RP: Scalable Fabrication of Flexible Electronics and Solar Cells with Improved Environmental Stability

这个创新研究伙伴关系（PFI-RP）项目的更广泛的影响/商业化潜力是使具有高性能和长寿命的廉价，轻便和灵活的电子设备商业化。这里开发的材料将提高多个市场的设备性能，并且该工艺将与高通量制造兼容。 这将影响具有高市场潜力的几种类型的设备，使显示器具有更低的功耗和更高的亮度，以及具有更长使用寿命的太阳能电池。 这些器件可以是薄的并且对于太阳能窗或透视显示器是半透明的，并且它们可以被封装在玻璃中以提供不可渗透的气密屏障。该PFI将使这些市场空间中的一家或多家初创公司得以成立，这反过来又会带来就业机会和经济发展。此外，该项目将培养一名博士后研究员和9名本科生，掌握仪器开发，材料沉积和表征方法的技能。学生还将通过参与创新的团队课程获得创新，创业和商业化方面的宝贵技能。该项目将特别招募STEM领域代表性不足的学生参加。该项目旨在解决大晶粒尺寸晶体半导体薄膜的需求，并大大改善各种器件的性能。 对于场效应晶体管，大于晶体管沟道长度的晶粒尺寸导致电荷载流子迁移率的改善，这使得能够实现更亮的显示器。 在基于混合有机-无机钙钛矿材料的光伏电池中，大的晶粒尺寸抑制在晶界处发生的降解机制。 基于溶液的薄膜沉积可以提供这些优点，同时还易于与高通量卷对卷制造工艺兼容。 该项目通过扩大写入头和采用卷对卷方法，将液体溶液沉积研究的最新进展提升到一个新的水平。预期的技术成果包括建造一个沉积单元，该单元将用于演示一个有机场效应晶体管阵列，该阵列将与有机发光二极管像素集成，形成一个简单的显示器。 第二个单元将用于展示具有改进性能的钙钛矿光伏电池。 通过控制薄膜特性（如晶粒尺寸）、使用具有高气密性的薄柔性玻璃基板以及通过激光密封方法实现玻璃与玻璃的粘合，可以实现长寿命和更高的环境稳定性。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercialization potential of this Partnerships for Innovation-Research Partnerships (PFI-RP) project is to enable commercialization of inexpensive, lightweight, and flexible electronic devices with high performance and a long lifetime. The materials developed here will improve the performance of devices across several markets and the process will be compatible with high-throughput manufacturing. This will impact several types of devices with high market potential, enabling displays with lower power consumption and higher brightness, as well as solar cells with extended useful lifetimes. The devices can be thin and semi-transparent for solar windows or for see-through displays, and they can be encapsulated in glass to provide an impermeable hermetic barrier. This PFI will enable the founding of one or more startups in these market spaces, which will in turn lead to employment opportunities and economic development. Moreover, this project will train one postdoctoral researcher and 9 undergraduates with skills in instrumentation development, material deposition, and characterization methods. Students will also receive valuable skills in innovation, entrepreneurship and commercialization through participation in an innovative team-based course. Students from groups that are underrepresented in STEM fields will be particularly recruited to participate in the project.The proposed project addresses the need for large grain-size crystalline semiconductor thin films with greatly improved properties for a wide range of devices. For field-effect transistors, grain size larger than the transistor channel length leads to improved charge carrier mobility, which enables brighter displays. In photovoltaic cells based on hybrid organic-inorganic perovskite materials, large grain size suppresses degradation mechanisms occurring at grain boundaries. Solution-based thin films deposition can deliver these advantages, while also being readily compatible with high-throughput roll-to-roll manufacturing processes. This project takes recent advances in research on deposition from liquid solutions to the next level by scaling up the writing heads and adopting roll-to-roll methods. The anticipated technical results include the construction of a deposition unit that will be used to demonstrate an array of Organic Field Effect Transistors, which will be integrated with Organic Light Emitting Diode pixels to form a simple display. A second unit will be used to demonstrate perovskite photovoltaic cells with improved properties. Long lifetime and improved environmental stability will be achieved through control of thin film properties such as grain size, through the use of thin flexible glass substrates with high hermeticity, and through glass-to-glass bonding by a laser sealing method.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.