Publication date: 21st July 2025
Doping of organic semiconductor films enhances their conductivity for applications in organic electronics, thermoelectrics and bioelectronics. However, much remains to be learnt about the properties of the conductive charges in order to optimize the design of the materials. Electrochemical doping is important for organic electrochemical transistors (OECTs) used in neuromorphic systems. Benefits of doping via electrochemistry include controllable doping levels, reversibility and high achievable carrier densities. We introduce a new technique, applying in-situ terahertz (THz) spectroscopy directly to electrochemically doped polymers in combination with time-resolved spectro-electrochemistry, chronoamperometry and OECT device measurements. We evaluate the intrinsic short-range transport properties of the polymers (without the effects of long-range disorder, grain boundaries and contacts), while precisely tuning the doping level, and thus the density and nature of charges species, via the applied oxidation voltage. Results will be shown for a variety of polymers, including polythiophene backbones with different sidechains and n-type BBL materials.