Organic Tribotronic Transistor for Contact‐Electrification‐Gated Light‐Emitting Diode

Tribotronics is a new field about the devices fabricated using the electrostatic potential created by contact electrification as a “gate” voltage to tune/control charge carrier transport in semiconductors. In this paper, an organic tribotronic transistor is proposed by coupling an organic thin film transistor (OTFT) and a triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) in vertical contact‐separation mode. Instead of using the traditional gate voltage for controlling, the charge carrier transportation in the OTFT can be modulated by the contact‐induced electrostatic potential of the TENG. By further coupling with an organic light‐emitting diode, a contact‐electrification‐gated light‐emitting diode (CG‐LED) is fabricated, in which the operating current and light‐emission intensity can be tuned/controlled by an external force–induced contact electrification. Two different modes of the CG‐LED have been demonstrated and the brightness can be decreased and increased by the applied physical contact, respectively. Different from the conventional organic light‐emitting transistor controlled by an electrical signal, the CG‐LED has realized the direct interaction between the external environment/stimuli and the electroluminescence device. By introducing optoelectronics into tribotronics, the CG‐LED has open up a new field of tribophototronics with many potential applications in interactive display, mechanical imaging, micro‐opto‐electro‐mechanical systems, and flexible/touch optoelectronics.