Two-dimensional quasi-freestanding molecular crystals for high-performance organic field-effect transistors

Abstract

Two-dimensional atomic crystals are extensively studied in recent years due to their exciting physics and device applications. However, a molecular counterpart, with scalable processability and competitive device performance, is still challenging. Here, we demonstrate that high-quality few-layer dioctylbenzothienobenzothiophene molecular crystals can be grown on graphene or boron nitride substrate via van der Waals epitaxy, with precisely controlled thickness down to monolayer, large-area single crystal, low process temperature and patterning capability. The crystalline layers are atomically smooth and effectively decoupled from the substrate due to weak van der Waals interactions, affording a pristine interface for high-performance organic transistors. As a result, monolayer dioctylbenzothienobenzothiophene molecular crystal field-effect transistors on boron nitride show record-high carrier mobility up to 10 cm2 V−1 s−1 and aggressively scaled saturation voltage ~1 V. Our work unveils an exciting new class of two-dimensional molecular materials for electronic and optoelectronic applications. Inorganic two-dimensional atomic crystals exhibit a variety of unusual but practically useful properties. Here, the authors produce an organic counterpart, atomically smooth monolayers of a molecular crystal, and use this organic analogue of graphene in high-performance organic field-effect transistors.