Condensed Matter Seminar

April 7 2016

G126 Noon

 

James G. Grote

US Air Force Research Laboratory

 

Biotronics
Biotechnology for Electronic & Photonic Applications

 

Abstract

Biotronics is the development and implementation of a new class of polymers that possess unique optical, electromagnetic and self-assembly properties that no other known polymer has. To date, they have demonstrated significant improvements in electronic and optoelectronic device performance. These non-fossil fuel-based biopolymer materials, derived from deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), silk and nucleobases are abundant, inexpensive and green materials that will not deplete our natural resources or harm the environment. They have shown the potential to enhance, or maybe someday even replace, fossil fuel-based polymers for applications ranging from eyeglasses to the higher technology applications, such as light emitting diodes, thin film transistors, capacitors, electro-optic modulators and solar cells. Preliminary in-house research in this area started around 2000 and since then, low optical losses of < 0.5dB/cm over a broad wavelength have been achieved, electrical resistivities 3-5 orders of magnitude lower than other polymer materials with the same optical loss have also been achieved and they are tunable. Their microwave losses are also low, making them very attractive for high speed electro-optic devices. Used as cladding layers in nonlinear (NLO) polymer-based electro-optic (EO) modulators, a 2X increase in nonlinearity, as well as a 3X reduction in the overall optical insertion loss of these devices has been achieved. These biopolymers have also been used as electron-blocking layers (EBLs) for organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs), demonstrating a > 3X increase in efficiency, for capacitors, demonstrating a 2X increase in dielectric breakdown and 3X increase in energy density, and NLO polymer EO modulators, demonstrating a 40% increase in nonlinearity and device yield, compared to devices without an EBL. Using biopolymer as gate dielectrics for both organic field effect transistor (OFETs) and graphene FETs, an order of magnitude lower gate voltage was achieved compared with devices using other polymer gate dielectrics. 100X increases in photoluminescence have been observed using biopolymer hosts, as well as brighter, whiter, longer lifetime solid state LEDs. These enhancements suggest significantly increased device efficiencies, higher outputs, lower operating powers and longer lifetimes. This new Biotronics technology shows great promise for a number of photonic and electronic applications, with demonstrated increase in device performance. This opens up a whole new field for bioengineering, in addition to the current genomic sequencing and clinical diagnosis and treatment applications. Where silicon is today’s fundamental building block for inorganic electronics and photonics, biopolymers hold promise to become tomorrow’s fundamental building block for organic photonics and electronics.