Quantitative dedoping of conductive polymers

Although doping is a cornerstone of the inorganic semiconductor industry, most devices using organic semiconductors (OSCs) make use of intrinsic (undoped) materials. Recent work on OSC doping has focused on the use of dopants to modify a material’s physical properties, such as solubility, in addition to electronic and optical properties. However, if these effects are to be exploited in device manufacturing, a method for dedoping organic semiconductors is required. Here, we outline two chemical strategies for dedoping OSC films. In the first strategy, we use an electron donor (a tertiary amine) to act as competitive donor. This process is based on a thermodynamic equilibrium between ionization of the donor and OSC and results in only partial dedoping. In the second strategy, we use an electron donor that subsequently reacts with the p-type dopant to create a nondoping product molecule. Primary and secondary amines undergo a rapid addition reaction with the dopant molecule 2,3,5,6-tetrafluoro-7,7,8,8,-tetra...