Biodegradable Natural Pectin-Based Polysaccharide-Gated Low-Voltage Flexible Oxide Thin-Film Transistors for Logic Applications

Electronic waste is one of the fastest growing kinds of waste in the world, and to reduce which, the biodegradable electronics are regarded as an important eco-friendly alternative to the environmentally hazardous ones. Here, biodegradable indium-tin-oxide (ITO) thin-film transistors (TFTs) are fabricated on flexible PET substrates with pectin-based polysaccharide films taken as gate dielectrics. For the basic performance, such biodegradable TFTs have not only exhibited excellent characteristics such as a low operating voltage of 1.0 V, a high current ON/OFF ratio (>107), a low subthreshold swing of 80 mV/dec, and a carrier mobility of 14.5 cm2V–1 s–1, but have also realized several important logic operations, such as NOT, AND, NAND, and so on. Additionally, for the eco-friendly purpose, the TFT arrays can be completely dissolved in water within 20 min. Based on the results achieved, the pectin-based biodegradable oxide transistors prepared here are expected to provide a possible choice for the fabrication of biodegradable electronics by using natural biomaterials.