Researchers seek to advance thin-film electronic devices

According to a report on the US Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory website, researchers have determined the pathways by which electrical charge is transported from molecule to molecule in an organic thin film.

Their results also show how such organic films can be chemically modified to improve conductance.

‘We have shown that when the molecules in organic thin films are aligned in particular directions, there is much better conductance,’ said Miquel Salmeron, project leader and director of Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division.

‘Chemists already know how to fabricate organic thin films in a way that can achieve such an alignment, which means they should be able to use the information provided by our methodology to determine the molecular alignment and its role on charge transport across and along the molecules. This will help improve the performances of future organic electronic devices.’

Salmeron and Shaul Aloni, also of the Materials Sciences Division, are the corresponding authors of a paper in the journal NanoLetters that describes this work.