Thermal analysis of active layer in organic thin-film transistors

This paper reports on the direct thermal observation of the pentacene - based organic thin-film transistors (OTFTs) under the real operating conditions. Liquid crystal (LC) spreading method was utilized for the thermal investigation of an active layer of the OTFT package. Temperature variation in the OTFT package was recorded for the different input power and significant heat generation was observed in the confined active layer. Detailed thermal performance of the OTFT package was projected using a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) method as well. It was shown that the driving of the OTFT package with the drain voltage of -15 V resulted in the active layer temperature of about 53.2 degrees C. The result indicates that the device design with effective thermal dissipation is imperative for reliable operation of the OTFT package. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.