Beyond Stretchability: Strength, Toughness, and Elastic Range in Semiconducting Polymers

Essentially all research done to date on the mechanical properties of polymeric semiconductors (e.g., for organic photovoltaics and thin-film transistors) has had the underlying goal of increasing the “stretchability”: that is, the deformability and softness. However, softness is the wrong characteristic for many of the applications envisioned for organic semiconductors, including touch screens, chemical sensors, and many distributed sources of...