How Do Organic, Plastic or Printed Electronics Work?
According to the Printed Electronics Network, "innovation in printed electronics is occurring alongside wider developments in organic and thin-film electronics. It is not sensible to try to define printed, plastic and organic electronics as separate terms. They are different ways of describing innovations in the electronics field, but they use common materials sets, processes and device architectures."The printed electronics process uses standard equipment on the printer side, for example the same equipment (or moderately modified) used for ink-jet and laser printing, screen printing, or offset lithography. It is in the inks used in printed electronics where the innovation lies. Electrically-functional inks are used to print working purposeful devices, such as thin film transistors.
The "inks" are made from semiconducting organic (carbon-based) polymeric materials in a solution-based format, making it possible to deposit materials onto a surface using additive or printing techniques.
Layers with different functions are printed - by building up layers using additive printing processes, combined with coating and patterning processes, an electronic device is generated.
History
In tracing the origins of the recent field of plastic or organic electronics, the men credited for the discovery and development of highly-conductive organic polymers are Alan J. Heeger, Alan G. MacDiarmid, and Hideki Shirakawa, who were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2000 for the 1977 discovery and development of oxidized, iodine-doped polyacetylene.
