The so-called soft electronic technology can also be called plastic electronic technology, organic semiconductor technology or printed electronic technology. The main purpose is to create future application requirements that silicon wafers and glass substrates cannot provide by printing electronic circuits on soft material substrates such as plastics.
Hard electricity: there is no major in hard electricity.
Current research and development hotspots of soft electronic technology
Cintellig, a British market research company, pointed out that in recent years, international companies are optimistic that soft electronics will form the next generation of star technology after semiconductors and TFT-LCD, and they have invested in research and development. In 2004 alone, as many as 4,549 patents were obtained, including 259 1 in Japan, accounting for more than half of the total number of patents, followed by 963 in the United States, and 546 inventors also took Japan.
At present, the research and development activities of soft electronics in the world mainly focus on soft display and printed wireless tag RFID. In recent years, the industry has made a breakthrough in the basic research on the characteristics of soft electronic components and materials, and successively put forward the design concepts or products of soft electronics such as printed wireless tags (RFID), flexible e-books, flexible product display posters, automobile dashboards, ultra-thin mobile phones with PDA curved display screens, and wrist electronic watches.
For example, SiPix Company of the United States published a report on the development of digital lithography technology through jet printing; In 2005, IMEC, a European research institute, announced that it had successfully developed a 50 MHz organic rectifier. In 2005, Japan Institute of Manufacturing Technology successfully developed the technology of making wireless tag antenna by printing. The mobility of printed transistors studied by Vivek Subramanian, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, reaches 0.2cm2/V-S, and the switching rate can reach 104.
In terms of products, Polymer Vision invested by Philips showed the first electronic reader prototype with scroll bar display-handheld electronic products in September 2005. It is expected to be put into production in 2006 and enter the market in 2007. Seiko of Japan announced the launch of watches using electronic paper in June 5438 +2006 10; Samsung galaxy also announced that in 2007-2009, soft electrical products will account for a large proportion; Nokia and PolymerVision are expected to launch soft-powered mobile phone products in 2007.
The insiders believe that in addition to flexible display and printed wireless tag RFID, organic transistors, memories, sensors and lighting are also the most promising aspects in the future.
From these research and development results, it can be predicted that the era of soft electronics is coming soon.
The soft electronics industry is still facing great challenges.
At present, soft electronics is still on the eve of industrialization, there are still many technical bottlenecks, and materials, processes and designs are still in the stage of research and exploration. Too high working voltage, low carrier mobility, unstable characteristics of materials and components, and lack of complementary transistor technology and component model all make the use of materials and processes more uncertain.
In terms of products, soft electronic products have loose structural characteristics and short product life due to the use of organic materials. According to the calculation of 5 hours per day, the product life will expire in 1 ~ 2 years, and it is also easy to be damaged in production and use. At present, the immature production equipment, low product yield and high cost and price all hinder the popularization of products.
In addition, the research and development of soft electronic technology needs to integrate a variety of high and new technologies, such as nano-electronics, semiconductor packaging, flat panel display and micro-electromechanical technology. The cooperation and benefit model between industries is not clear, and how to build the industrial chain is not clear. So at present, the pace of commercialization seems to be less than expected, even if the technology is commercialized, it is only used for limited purposes. For example, the organic electroluminescent (0LED) flat panel display, which is the most widely used product in industrialization at present, is only a small molecule OLEO facing the stage of marketization, while the polymer-based organic light-emitting diode is still a long way from marketization.
Therefore, in general, the international research in the field of soft electronics is still in its infancy, and there is a lot of room for technological breakthroughs and patent applications.