Carbon nanotubes electrodes as intrinsic conductors for organic and printed electronic applications

碳纳米管因其高的载流子迁移率、简单的合成和溶液处理能力而成为最有前途的电子材料之一。这些材料具有广泛的潜在应用前景，例如有机光电和光伏器件中的有源层、传感器和场效应管。然而，仍然需要为这些材料开发合适的加工方法，以获得实现其独特性能所需的形貌；特别是对于大规模应用。因此，这项研究建议集中于开发制造具有最大光学透明度和电导率的薄而均匀的碳纳米管片的方法。到目前为止，该行业的大多数商业应用都依赖于单一的透明导体，铟锡氧化物(ITO)，一种透明的导电氧化物。虽然ITO适用于现有技术，但事实证明，它不太适合用于新兴的有机光电子学领域。我们的团队最近开发了一种简单的室温沉积技术来制备具有良好光学透明性和电导性的薄而灵活的碳纳米管片。这些薄片首次表明，碳纳米管电极可以用作高性能小分子有机电致发光器件的空穴注入阳极。这些结果有力地证明了新型碳纳米管阳极是替代透明导电氧化物的一种可行的方法。我们将进一步探索碳纳米管片材的制造工艺，使其具有可扩展性，并能很好地适应于印刷SS电子器件。一种强有力的化学方法以及增加碳纳米管片材的导电性和透明度将被开发用于SS器件的制造。我们相信，这种方法将生产出性能优于传统ITO设备的SS设备。它还将提供可用于其他电子应用的新功能材料。鉴于透明导体在光电设备中的普遍使用，从触摸屏和平板显示器到光伏电池，目前的提议对未来消费电子的发展产生了广泛的影响。

Carbon nanotubes are emerging amongst the most promising electronic materials due to their high carrier mobilities, simple synthesis and solution processability. These materials promise a range of potential applications such as active layers in organic optoelectronic and photovoltaic devices, sensors, and field-effect transistors. However, there is still a need to develop suitable processing methods for these materials to obtain the necessary morphologies for realizing their unique properties; especially for large-scale applications. This research proposal thus focuses on developing methods for producing thin and uniform carbon nanotube sheets exhibiting maximal optical transparencies and electrical conductivities. Up to now, the industry has relied on a single transparent conductor, indium tin oxide (ITO) a transparent conducting oxide, for most commercial applications. While ITO has been suitable for existing technologies it was proven to be less than ideal for use in the emerging field of organic optoelectronics. Our team has recently developed a simple room temperature deposition technique to fabricate thin and flexible carbon nanotubes sheets exhibiting excellent optical transparencies and electrical conductivities. These sheets have been used to show for the first time that CNT electrodes can be used as hole injecting anodes for high performance small molecule OLEDs. These results convincingly demonstrate that novel carbon nanotube anodes are a viable alternative to transparent conducting oxides. We will explore further the CNT sheet fabrication process to make it scalable and well adapted for printing SS electronics. A robust chemical approach together with an increase in the CNT sheet conductivity and transparency will be developed for SS device fabrication. We believe this approach will produce SS devices exhibiting performances superior to traditional ITO based devices. It will also provide new functional materials that could be useful for other electronic applications. Given the ubiquitous use of transparent conductors in optoelectronic appliances, from touch-screens and flat panel displays to photovoltaic cells, the current proposal has wide ranging impact on the development of future consumer electronics.