Electrical Characteristics of Pentacene Thin Film
Junctions
V. Sivaji Reddy, S. Das, S.K. Ray and A. Dhar*
Abstract— The electrical properties of ITO/pentacene/Al
diode have been investigated by current – voltage (I-V),
capacitance – frequency (C-f), and capacitance – voltage (C-
V) measurements. The current-voltage characteristics at
different temperatures are analyzed in the framework of
space charge limited current (SCLC) model. From the
measured diode capacitances, it is revealed that the
frequency-dependent properties are related to the localized
traps in the band gap of pentacene. The C-V characteristics
at different test frequencies have been presented. From the
capacitance-voltage data the ionized acceptor density, the
diffusion potential, and the width of the depletion region are
calculated to be 4.0 × 1017 cm-3, 2.4 V, and 45 nm,
respectively.
Index Terms: —Capacitance measurement, Charge carrier
mobility, Current density , Semiconductor junctions.
I. INTRODUCTION
In recent years, organic semiconductors have been
studied extensively because of their potential applications
in light emitting diodes [1], field effect transistors [2],
and solar cells [3]. Among various organic
semiconductors, pentacene is one of the most promising
candidates for low cost organic thin film transistors
(OTFT) due to its comparatively high-field effect hole
mobility [4,5]. Despite the important role of pentacene in
current organic semiconductor research, very little
information is known about the carrier transport
properties, nature of metal/pentacene contacts, and
internal device structure. In this paper, experimental and
theoretical efforts have been carried out to investigate the
current – voltage (I-V), capacitance – voltage (C-V), and
capacitance – frequency characteristics of
ITO/Pentacene/Al diode.
II. EXPERIMENTAL
A 150 nm thick indium tin oxide (ITO) film with sheet
resistance 10 Ω/□ is used as the bottom contact of the
device. Before pentacene deposition, ITO substrates were
cleaned thoroughly in acetone, isopropyl alcohol and de-
ionized water in sequence by an ultrasonic cleaner
followed by drying with nitrogen gas. A 500 nm thick
pentacene layer was deposited over patterned ITO
substrates by thermal evaporation at a base pressure of
5×10-6 mbar. During pentacene deposition, substrates
were kept at room temperature. Finally, aluminum top
electrodes were deposited by thermal evaporation through
Manuscript received September 15, 2007. This work was supported
partially by the CSIR Program under grant No. 03/1016/05/EMR-II,
Govt of India. The author (SD) acknowledges the financial support
during his tenure in the project.
All the authors are with Department of Physics & Meteorology ,
Indian Institute of technology, Kharagpur, India. phone: 03222-281630;
fax: +91 3222 255303; e-mail: adhar@ phy.iitkgp.ernet.in).
978-1-4244-1728-5/07/$25.00 ©2007 IEEE
1
shadow mask.
The thickness of the pentacene layer was measured by
stylus profilometer (Veeco Dektak3). The dc current-
voltage characteristics of the devices were obtained using
Keithley 485 Pico ammeter and Advantest R6144
programmable dc voltage generator. The capacitance-
voltage and capacitance-frequency measurements were
done using an Agilent 4294A precision impedance
analyzer in the frequency range from 100 Hz to 10 MHz.
The amplitude of the AC signal was kept at 100 mV.
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The current density-voltage characteristics of the
ITO/pentacene/Al diode in the temperature range
between 300 and 388 K are shown in Fig.1. The J-V
characteristics have shown rectifying behavior. The
valance and conduction band edges of pentacene are
located at about 5.0 and 3.2 eV from the vacuum level,
respectively [6]. The work functions of ITO and Al are
around 4.8 and 4.3 eV, respectively. The ITO/pentacene
interface forms ohmic contact because of the low energy
barrier for hole injection. On the other hand,
pentacene/Al interface forms Schottky contact generating
a depletion region of width w in pentacene. When the
forward bias is applied, the barrier height at the interface
decreases, turning on the diode. Where as, the barrier
height increases at reverse bias to block the current.
The space charge limited current (SCLC) model
has been widely used to describe the charge transport in
organic semiconductors because of the low mobility of
-5
10
Current density (A/cm )
2
-6
10
-7
10
388 K
-8 373 K
10
348 K
333 K
-9
10
-10 -5 0 5 10
Voltage (V)
Fig.1. Current density – voltage characteristics of
ITO/pentacene/Al diode at various temperatures.
the charge carriers . The space charge limited current is
described by the following equation [7,8]
9 V2
J= εµ p 3 , (1)
8 L
 2

where ε = ε0εr is the permittivity of the polymer, µp is the
hole mobility and L is the device thickness. The SCLC
model has been proposed to explain the bulk transport
dominated conduction processes in organic
semiconductors. This model is applicable at the low
electric field conditions, where mobility is a constant. At
high electric fields, the SCLC model ignores the field
dependent mobility. Field dependant models have been
used to describe the mobility at high electric field
conditions. According to this field dependent model, the
current density,
J = P ( x )eµ p [ E ( x )]E ( x ) , (2)
temperatures is extracted from SCLC model and shown
as an Arrhenius plot in Figure 4. The zero-field hole
mobility increases exponentially from 1.6 × 10-9 cm2/Vs
to 7.1 × 10-8 cm2/Vs as the temperature is increased from
300 K to 388 K. The behavior of hole mobility can be
described by Eq.(4), with activation energy ∆ = 0.42 eV
and prefactor µ0 = 1.26 × 10-2 cm2/Vs.
The capacitance – frequency characteristics of
-7
10

µp(E=0) (cm /Vs)

where µp(E) is the field dependent mobility given by,

2
-8
10
E ),
µ p ( E ) = µ p ( 0 ) exp( γ (3)
where µp(0) is the zero field mobility given by,

∆ (4)
µ p (0) = µ0 exp(− )
k BT -9
10
and 2.4 2.6 2.8 3.0 3.2 3.4
1 1 , (5) 1000/T (K )
-1
− γ = B( )
k BT k BT0 Figure 3 Arrhenius plot of zero-field mobility
where P(x) is the hole density at position x, E(x) is the versus temperature.
electric field at position x, µ0 is a constant prefactor, ∆ is ITO/Pentacene/Al device measured in the frequency
the activation energy, and T0 and B are material range of 100 Hz to 10 MHz are shown in Figure 4. The
constants. capacitance decreases sharply with increasing frequency,
The experimental and theoretical J-V2 which is due to the slow response of the trapped charges
characteristics at different temperatures under forward in the band gap of pentacene.
bias conditions are shown in Figure 2. The theoretical
results have been calculated from the conventional SCLC 3x10
-9

model (Eq.(1)), using L = 500 nm and assuming εr = 3.

-9
2x10
Capacitance (F)

-5 300 K
1.6x10 323 K -9
2x10
Current density (A/cm )

333 K
2

348 K
373 K -9
1.2x10
-5
1x10
388 K

-10
-6
5x10
8.0x10

0
-6 2 3 4 5 6 7
4.0x10 10 10 10 10 10 10

0.0
0 20 40
Square of voltage (V )
Figure 2 J-V2 characteristics of ITO/Pentacene/Al
diode at different temperatures in forward direction.
The solid lines represent the calculated J-V2
characteristics according to conventional SCLC
model.
Theoretical results are in good agreement with the
experimental data at low electric field conditions. At
higher electric fields, experimentally observed current
density is larger than expected from Eq.(1). This gradual
deviation from the square law is due to field dependent
mobility, which is described by Eq.(3).
The zero-field hole mobility of pentacene at different
Frequency (Hz)
Figure4. Frequency dependence of the zero bias
60 80 100 120 capacitance of ITO/Pentacene/Al diode.
2
The capacitance – voltage characteristics of
ITO/Pentacene/Al diode at different frequencies are
shown in Figure 5. The capacitance of the device
increases sharply in the forward direction till a point
where it reaches a maximum value and then decreases
with further increase in forward bias. The capacitance
varies slowly until a point where the majority carrier
(holes) injection begins from the anode and then
increases sharply to reach the maximum value which is
due to the charging of the traps. The majority carrier
injection can be noticed from the sharp increase in the
capacitance. When the voltage is increased further, the
minority carrier injection occurs, which results in
recombination of electrons and holes and the
 3

neutralization of trapped charges in the depletion region the reported results [6]. From the extrapolated intercept of
[9]. Then the amount of charge that is present in the 1/C2 versus V curve the diffusion potential VD is found to
pentacene decreases significantly. So, the capacitance of be 2.4 V. The calculated values of NA and VD are used to
the device decreases at higher voltages. obtain the width of the depletion layer w by using the
following equation:

5x10
-9
100 Hz
2ε ε (V −V) (8)
500 Hz
1 kHz w= 0 D

5 kHz qN
Capacitance (F)

-9
4x10 10 kHz A
50 kHz
100 kHz
-9
The value of w is found to be 45 nm at zero bias.
3x10

-9
2x10 IV. CONCLUSION
The electrical properties of ITO/pentacene/Al diode
1x10
-9
have been studied. The charge conduction mechanism of
-8 -6 -4 -2 0 2 4 6 8
the device has been investigated by studying the I-V
Voltage (V) characteristics at different temperatures. At low electric
Figure5. Capacitance – voltage characteristics of fields charge conduction follows pure SCLC mechanism,
ITO/Pentacene/Al diode at different frequencies. whereas at higher fields I-V characteristics deviate from
The device parameters like ionized acceptor the square law. Deviation of I-V characteristics from
concentration NA, the diffusion potential VD and the square law is attributed to the field dependant mobility of
width of the depletion layer w have been calculated from the charge carriers. From the measured diode
the low frequency capacitance – voltage characteristics. capacitances, it is revealed that the frequency-dependent
For an abrupt junction the junction capacitance C is given properties are related to the localized traps in the band
by [10], gap of pentacene. From the capacitance-voltage data the
ionized acceptor density, the diffusion potential, and the
(6)
qε εN width of the depletion region are calculated to be 4.0 ×
C = A 0 A
1017 cm-3, 2.4 V, and 45 nm, respectively.
2 (V − V )D

where A is the device area. Equation (6) describes a

linear variation of 1/C2 with voltage in the voltage range REFERENCES
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1 2 (V − V ) (7)
= D
[2] D.J.Gundlach et al., “Pentacene Organic Thin-Film
C 2
A q ε εN
2
0 A
Transistors—Molecular Ordering and Mobility”,
IEEE Electron Device Letters, V.18, P.87, 1997.
The low frequency (100 Hz) 1/C2 – V plot of
ITO/Pentacene/Al diode is shown in Figure 7. This shows [3] Christoph J. Brabec et al., “Plastic solar cells”, Adv.
that1/C2 varies linearly with applied voltage in the Funct. Mater. V.11, P. 15, 2001.
reverse direction (V<2.4 V).
17
[4] Guanzhong Wang et al., “High mobility organic
4x10 transistors fabricated from single pentacene
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Experimental
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3x10
[5] Oana D. Jurchescu et al., “Effect of impurities on
the mobility of single crystal pentacene”, Appl.
1/C (F )

Phys.Lett., V.84, P.3061, 2004.

-2

17
2x10
[6] Y.S.Lee et al., “Electrical characteristics of
2

pentacene-based Schottky diodes”, Optical Materials,

17 V.21, P. 433, 2002.
1x10

[7] M. A. Lampert and P. Mark, “Current Injection in

Solids”, Academic Press , New York, 1970.
0
-8 -6 -4 -2 0 2 4 6 8 [8] Kwan.C.Kao and Wei Hwang, “Electrical transport
Voltage (V) in solids”, Pergamon press, New York, 1981.

Figure7. Variation of 1/C2 as a function of [9] Vishal Shrotriya et al., “Capacitance-voltage

applied bias. characterization of polymer light-emitting diodes”,
J. Appl. Phys., V.97, P.054504, 2005.
From the slope of 1/C2 versus V curve the ionized
acceptor density NA can be calculated using Eq. (7). For [10] S.M. Sze, “Physics of semiconductor devices”, 2nd
the device shown in Figure 7 the value of NA is calculated edition, John Wiley & Sons, Singapore, 1981.
to be 4.0 × 1017 cm-3, which is in good agreement with
 4

V. Sivaji Reddy received the B.Sc. degree from Nagarjuna University,

Andhra Pradesh, India in 2001, the M.Sc. degree in physics from
Andhra University, Andhra Pradesh, India in 2003 and the M.Phil.
degree from University of Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India in 2004.
Currently, he is pursuing his research work for Ph.D. in the area of
transport properties of organic light emitting diodes.

S. Das received the B.Sc. degree in physics from Vidyasagar

University, West Bengal, India, in 2003, and the M.Sc. degree in
physics from Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpurs, India, in 2005,
where he is currently working toward the Ph.D. degree in physics at
the Department of physics and Meteorology. His research interests are
quantum dot floating gate memory device and silicon-germanium
photodetectors on silicon substrate.

Prof. Samit K. Ray is a Professor in the Department of Physics &

Meteorology, IIT Kharagpur, India. His research interests are in the
area of Semiconductor nanostructures, MBE growth of SiGe quantum
dots, Strained SiGe/SiGeC heterostructure devices, Terahertz sources
and detectors, and High-k gate dielectrics for nano-scaled MOSFETs.
He has served as a visiting scientist / faculty at the University of
Delaware, Newark, USA, University of Texas, Austin, USA and Tokyo
Institute of Technology, Japan. He has published more than 200
research papers in journals and conferences and co-authored a book on
“Strained silicon heterostructures: materials and devices” published by
IEE, UK.

A.Dhar did his Ph D from Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India, in 1991

on experimental condensed matter physics. Currently he is Assistant
Professor in the department of Physics and Meteorology, IIT
Kharagpur, India. His research interest is in the area of thin film science
and technology particularly semiconducting and dielectric thin films.
His current interest is on organic optoelectronics and nano technology.