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The Semiconductor/Conductor Interface Piezoresistive Effect in an Organic

Transistor for Highly Sensitive Pressure Sensors

Article  in  Advanced Materials · February 2019

DOI: 10.1002/adma.201805630

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Communication
Pressure Sensors www.advmat.de

The Semiconductor/Conductor Interface Piezoresistive

Effect in an Organic Transistor for Highly Sensitive
Pressure Sensors
Zhongwu Wang, Shujing Guo, Hongwei Li, Bin Wang, Yongtao Sun, Zeyang Xu,
Xiaosong Chen, Kunjie Wu, Xiaotao Zhang, Feifei Xing, Liqiang Li,* and Wenping Hu

Pressure sensor is one of the most fas-

The piezoresistive pressure sensor, a kind of widely investigated artificial cinating and important components of
device to transfer force stimuli to electrical signals, generally consists of one E-skin that possesses unique abilities to
or more kinds of conducting materials. Here, a highly sensitive pressure imitate, enhance, and replace the human’s
sensor based on the semiconductor/conductor interface piezoresistive effect tactile sensation.[1–16] Among the different
kinds of pressure sensors,[17–30] piezoresis-
is successfully demonstrated by using organic transistor geometry. Because
tive sensors generally have simple struc-
of the efficient combination of the piezoresistive effect and field-effect modu- tures and easy read-out characteristics,
lation in a single sensor, this pressure sensor shows excellent performance, which make them highly promising for
such as high sensitivity (514 kPa−1), low limit of detection, short response application.[31–34] However, on the other
and recovery time, and robust stability. More importantly, the unique gate hand, the simple output signal (current or
resistance) presents difficulty to identify the
modulation effect in the transistor endows the sensor with an unparalleled
complex and multiple stimuli. As for the
ability—tunable sensitivity via bias conditions in a single sensor, which is of organic field-effect transistor (OFET)-based
great significance for applications in complex pressure environments. The sensors, the unique current amplification
novel working principle and high performance represent significant progress function of transistor makes it ideal can-
in the field of pressure sensors. didate for sensing weak signals, and their
multiple output parameters (source–drain
current, threshold voltage, current on/off
ratio, subthreshold swing) enable it to dis-
Z. W. Wang, Prof. X. T. Zhang, Prof. L. Q. Li, Prof. W. P. Hu tinguish complex signals.[35–37] Furthermore, every component
Tianjin Key Laboratory of Molecular Optoelectronic Sciences of OFETs including gate electrode, dielectric layer, semicon-
Department of Chemistry ductor layer, and drain/source electrodes can be probably used
School of Sciences as active layer of sensors,[38,39] which provides more possibilities
Tianjin University
Tianjin 300072, China
for integration of multiple sensing.[40–44] In some reported sen-
E-mail: lilq@tju.edu.cn sors, tuning dielectric capacitance of OFET by pressure is mainly
Z. W. Wang, S. J. Guo, Dr. H. W. Li, Z. Y. Xu, Dr. X. S. Chen, Dr. K. J. Wu, used as the basic working principle. Bao and co-workers pio-
Prof. L. Q. Li neered in using microstructured poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS)
Advanced Nanomaterials Division as dielectric of OFET for sensing pressure with sensitivity of
Key Laboratory of Nanodevices and Applications 0.55 kPa−1.[22] Zhu and co-workers utilized a suspended gate for
Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics (SINANO)
Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) construction of pressure sensor with sensitivity of 192 kPa−1.[30]
Suzhou 215123, China However, the tuning of capacitance in OFET may suffer from
Z. W. Wang, Prof. F. F. Xing the risk of impurity or breakdown. As stated above, all com-
Department of Chemistry ponents of OFET might be used for the pressure sensors, but
Shanghai University OFET-based pressure sensors using semiconductor and source/
Shanghai 200444, China
drain electrodes have not been reported so far.
B. Wang, Prof. Y. T. Sun
Department of Mechanics
In OFETs, the contact interface between semiconductor
Tianjin Key Laboratory of Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos Control and source/drain electrodes determines the charge injection
Tianjin University efficiency and thus greatly influences the device performance,
Yaguan Road 135, Tianjin 300350, China which therefore provides a model for pressure sensing if the
Prof. L. Q. Li contact quality can be tuned by pressure with an appropriate
Institute of Molecular Aggregation Science device structure. Piezoresistive sensor with roughened contact
Tianjin University
Tianjin 300072, China interface provides inspiration, but the active components of
conventional piezoresistive sensor generally consist of one or
The ORCID identification number(s) for the author(s) of this article
can be found under https://doi.org/10.1002/adma.201805630. more kinds of conducting materials since the low bulk resis-
tivity of conducting materials may enable the contact resist-
DOI: 10.1002/adma.201805630 ance to dominate the sensor device and therefore produce

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high sensing performance.[45,46] From this point of view, the
piezoresistive semiconductor/conductor contact is unsuitable
for pressure sensor, because the high resistivity of semicon-
ductor layer may overshadow the interface piezoresistive effect.
Consequently, the piezoresistive effect in semiconductor/­
conductor interface has never been utilized in pressure sensor
so far. It is known that, compared to conductor, semiconductor
has unique electrical, optical, thermal, and magnetic proper-
ties. Therefore, if semiconductor/conductor interface piezore-
sistive effect can be applied to the field of pressure sensor
through an appropriate strategy, the unique properties of
semiconductor may improve pressure sensor with more func-
tions and high performance. Following this train of thought,
field-effect transistors may provide chance to activate the inert
semiconductor/conductor piezoresistive effect, because gate
modulation could greatly tune the conductivity of semiconduc-
tors. Despite the above analysis, the pressure sensor based on
semiconductor/conductor interface piezoresistive effect in FET
has still not been reported before.
Here, we have used the semiconductor/conductor interface
piezoresistive effect for pressure sensor for the first time, which
is activated by gate modulation in OFET. This sensor efficiently
combines piezoresistive effect and gate modulation effect of
transistor. As a result, the sensor shows a high sensitivity up
to 514 kPa−1 by applying appropriate voltage, which represents
one of the highest values among pressure sensors previously
reported. Moreover, the sensor shows short response time as
small as 1.8 ms during loading and 6.7 ms during unloading,
and high durability of over 10 000 cycles measurement. In addi-
tion to these outstanding sensing parameters, it also showed
sensitivity tunability through applying bias conditions, which is
of great significance for applying sensor to a complex pressure
environment. In aspect of practical application, the sensor suc-
cessfully detected the motion of wrist and accurately captured
the weak signals of wrist pulses. Furthermore, the integrated
matrix of sensors performed well to distinguish the pressure
distribution.
Schematic fabrication process of the piezoresistive OFET-
based pressure sensor is illustrated in Figure  1a. The elastic
PDMS with micropyramids was fabricated from the silicon
mold, and then Au was deposited through a shadow mask
to form couple electrode. The microstructured PDMS with

Figure 1.  a) Schematic fabrication process of the pressure sensor. b) Schematic diagrams of the change of channel length. c,d) The microscopic picture
of the channel and an SEM image of the pyramidical structure on a PDMS electrode, respectively. e) Photograph of real device.

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patterned Au was designed as drain/source electrodes and
then laminated onto the semiconductor layer to form the
OFET-based sensor devices. Detailed fabrication information
can be seen in the Experimental Section. The working prin-
ciple of this sensor is mainly based on the tunable contact
quality between drain/source electrodes and semiconductor
as well as the gate modulation. When Au/ PDMS electrodes
were laminated on the semiconductor layer, transistor was
completed, in which carriers are injected from the micro-
structured source/semiconductor interface, subsequently flow
through the conductive channel, and finally are collected by
the microstructured drain/semiconductor interface. Hence,
the total resistance between drain and source electrodes con-
sists of contact resistance (Rcon) and channel resistance (Rch),
as described in Equation (1).
R total = Rcon + Rch  (1)
With the application of pressure on PDMS electrode, the
pyramidical peaks were deformed, and the deformation size
is theoretically calculated (for details, see Figure S1 in the
Supporting Information). The increased contact area between
electrode and semiconductor improves the carrier’s injection
efficiency and thus reduces the contact resistance (Rcon). In
addition, channel resistance is generally related to the length
(L) and width (W) of conductive channel. When the PDMS/Au
micropyramids were deformed to a larger contact area under
pressure, the effective channel length decreased (Figure 1b)
and thus contributes to the reduction of the channel resist-
ance, but the change range of channel length is limited. As for
channel width, in this sensor with microstructured PDMS/
Au electrode, the current spreading may render the actual
channel width to show independence or weak dependence
on the contact area of electrode, i.e., the actual channel width
shows no or small change during the deformation of micro-
structured electrode. Therefore, the deformation of micropyra-
mids effectively changes the electrode/semiconductor contact
resistance, and simultaneously tunes the channel resistance
in a relatively small range. On the other hand, the conductivity
of channel is closely related to the amount of charges induced
by gate voltage, so this semiconductor/conductor piezoresis-
tive effect also greatly benefits from the electric-field modula-
tion effect.
Figure 1c and Figure 1d show the microscopic picture of
channel and scanning electron microscope (SEM) image of
pyramidical structure on PDMS/Au electrodes, respectively.
The Au film deposited on PDMS is dense and smooth without
any crack after the treatment of modifier ((3-mercaptopropyl)
trimethoxysilane) in our fabrication process.[47,48] Uniform and
sharp peak arrays can be seen on the patterned PDMS film
with a density of 3600 peaks mm−2. The width of the bottom
edge and the height of the pyramids are approximately 14 and
10  µm, respectively. In this sensor, a kind of p-type organic
semiconductor dinaphtho[2,3-b:2′,3′-f ]thieno[3,2-b]thiophene
(DNTT), which showed a high mobility of 1–2 cm2 V−1 s−1 in
ambient environment derived from standard top-contact tran-
sistor with the same device parameters as pressure sensor
(Figure S2, Supporting Information), was chosen as the active
layer. The picture of completed device is presented in Figure 1e.
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To facilitate the connection of drain/source electrodes and char-
acterization system and to fix the PDMS electrode on semi-
conductor layer, conductive silver paint was scribbled on both
sides of PDMS layer. It’s worth mentioning that the fluoropol-
ymer Cytop was used as buffer layer to decrease the bias stress
effect significantly and enhance the stability of sensor,[49,50]
(Figure S3, Supporting Information), which is highly important
for sensor application.
To test the sensor’s electrical and sensing performance, a
series of measurements were performed. Figure  2a,b presents
transfer curves and output curves of sensor under different
pressure. The drain current changed significantly in response
to different pressure, which can be understood as follows:
The deformed micropyramids on PDMS/Au electrode under
pressure can reduce the contact resistance as well as channel
resistance, and therefore increase the drain current. However,
it should be noted that the basic transistor equation in the
saturation region could not be used to quantitatively describe
the drain current in this OFET-based sensor, because the con-
tact resistance is significant in this device. As a comparison,
another device with Au-coated flat PDMS electrode was fab-
ricated to verify the effect of microstructured interface. As
expected, this device did not exhibit obvious response to pres-
sure (Figure S4, Supporting Information), which demonstrates
the microstructured drain/source electrode is one key element
for sensor. Figure 2c shows the dependence of time-resolved
drain current on different pressure. The stable stepped respon-
sive current demonstrates the robust sensing performance and
high resolution of the sensor. Besides, through analyzing the
data in Figure S2 (Supporting Information) and Figure 2c, we
could find that the total resistance between source and drain
electrode of DNTT-based pressure sensor varies from 30 to
3000 MΩ in Vgs = −10 V, Vds = −60 V (derived from Figure 2c),
while the value of standard top-contact DNTT transistor is only
about 6 MΩ (derived from Figure S2 in the Supporting Infor-
mation) with the same channel parameters and bias conditions.
This fact proves that the contact resistance plays the domi-
nating role in sensor.
According to the relationship of drain current as a function
of pressure, the calibration curve in Figure 2d displayed the
relative change of current in different pressure range with bias
condition of Vgs = −10 V, Vds = −60 V. Here, the sensitivity (S) is
defined as Equation (2)
∂(I − I 0 ) /I 0
S= (2)
∂P 
where I0 and I are the initial drain current under zero pres-
sure and the responsive drain current under certain applied
pressure, respectively. P represents the applied pressure. By
deriving the slope of calibration curve in linear sensing regions
(Figure 2d), we got the highest sensitivity of the sensor up to
514 kPa−1, which is higher than the reported OFET-based sen-
sors.[9,30] It also represents one of the highest values in the
existing pressure sensors, as listed in Table  1. According to
Equation (2), mathematically, high sensitivity can be obtained
under two conditions: low initial current and large output cur-
rent change under certain pressure. Our sensor is based on
semiconductor/conductor interface piezoresistive effect, which
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Figure 2.  a,b) Transfer curves and output curves of the pressure sensor under different pressure in the condition of Vgs = −60 V, Vds = −60 V. c) The
dependence of time-resolved drain current on pressure. d) The calibration curve. Inset, magnified view of calibration curve in low pressure range. e) The
sensor’s limit of detection with Vgs = −10 V, Vds = −60 V. f) Response and recovery time test, the circuit diagram is presented in inset. g) The stability
test of sensor over 10 000 cycles under 500 Pa.

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Table 1.  Summary of some reported pressure sensors’ characteristics.
No. Types of device Sensitivity
1 Microstructured PDMS dielectric −1
8.2 kPa
2 Suspended gate transistor 192 kPa−1
3 Hollow-sphere microstructure 133.1 kPa−1
4 Microstructured graphene arrays 5.53 kPa−1
5 PEDOT:PSS/PUD-covered micropyramid array 56.8 kPa−1
6 Ultrathin gold nanowire >1.14 kPa−1
7 Graphene–polyurethane sponge 0.26 kPa−1
8 Mimosa-inspired micropattern 50.17 kPa−1
9 Honeycomb-like graphene film 161.6 kPa−1
10 Irregular hemisphere micropattern 851 kPa−1
11 Copper nanowires composite aerogel 6.685 kPa−1
This work Microstructured drain/source electrode 514 kPa−1
has three merits: 1) the conductivity of semiconductor is quite
low, so the initial current could reach low level; 2) the interface
piezoresistive effect is intrinsically beneficial for the change of
contact area, which thus leads to big output current/resistance
change; and 3) the field-effect modulation in OTFT geometry
can further enhance the current/resistance change over several
orders of magnitude, especially in the subthreshold regime. The
above three aspects contribute to the high sensitivity together.
In Figure 2d, it could be seen that three clear linear regions
appeared in calibration curve; these regions represent three
deformation stages of micropyramids under pressure.[55] The
first region has a small slope in low pressure range below
30 Pa, which corresponds a sensitivity of 113 kPa−1 (inset of
Figure 2d). The working mechanism of sensor in this pres-
sure range is based on the increase of contact points between
electrode and semiconductor interface, which also belongs
to the sensing mechanism of piezoresistive sensor. With the
increasing of pressure, the interface of micropyramids and
semiconductor turns from point-to-face contact to face-to-
face contact, which causes a rapid increase of current and the
highest slope in 30–230 Pa. When the applied pressure exceeds
230 Pa, the interface is entirely connected by the side face of
micropyramids and semiconductor layer. Meanwhile, the com-
pressed micropyramids produce stronger resistance to external
pressure, so the increasing speed of contact area returns to a
slow state.
Figure 2e shows the limit of detection (LOD) of the sensor
in the condition of Vgs  =  −10 V, Vds  =  −60 V. A static pressure
method was adopted in this measurement,[12,22] namely, the
sensor was pressed by silicon wafer piece to test LOD. To get
a reliable LOD, several cycle tests were performed, in which
the sensing signals show good repeatability. The obtained LOD
value is as low as 10 Pa, which is located in the subtle-pressure
regime (1–1000 Pa).[56] Furthermore, the response and recovery
time was characterized. The device is connected in series with a
10 MΩ resistor like the inset in Figure 2f, and the total voltage
applied on device and resistor is 100 V. By using tweezers to
quickly tap the device and measuring the voltage change on
resistor, excellent response time of as small as 1.8 ms during
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Limit of detection Response time Refs.
– <10 ms [9]
<0.5 Pa 10 ms [30]
0.8 Pa 47 ms [18]
1.5 Pa 0.2 ms [13]
23 Pa 200 ms [20]
13 Pa <17 ms [46]
9 Pa – [19]
10.4 Pa <20 ms [51]
9 Pa – [52]
34 Pa 0.15 ms [53]
800 Pa 10 ms [54]
10 Pa 1.8 ms
loading and 6.7 ms during unloading was obtained. Considering
the contact time between tweezers and device during test, the
response and recovery time still maintains in the level of tens of
millisecond (Figure S5 and Movie S1, Supporting Information).
To further investigate the repeatability and stability of device,
we repeatedly measured responsive drain current under 500 Pa
for several cycles (Figure S6, Supporting Information), which
exhibited excellent repeatability. SEM images of micropyramids
were taken before and after pressing (Figure S7, Supporting
Information), indicating the good elasticity of PDMS. Then, a
continuously cyclic stability test was further performed under
500 Pa over 10 000 cycles (3.8 s for each cycle) for 10 h as shown
in Figure 2g and Movie S2 in the Supporting Information. For
facilitating measurement, a force gauge installed on a com-
puter-controlled stepper motor was used to apply pressure on
the sensor, and circuit connection was the same as response
time test (inset of Figure 2f). The total applied voltage on device
and resistor is 80 V. Besides, to produce uniform pressure on
sensor device, a piece of silicon was covered on PDMS elec-
trode. During stability test, although some tiny cracks appeared
in Au film, which might have been caused by repeated pressing,
the sensors could still work well despite the slight performance
attenuation (Figure S8, Supporting Information). The result
demonstrates the good repeatability and durability of device,
which is enough for some applications.
Different from other kinds of pressure sensors,[57] OFET-
based sensors have an unparalleled advantage—the modulation
effect of gate voltage, which may lead to the tunable sensitivity.
Generally, high sensitivity sensor has advantage to detect small
pressure stimuli, and therefore is highly important for some
applications, but it also increases risk of detecting some use-
less weak disturbing stimuli. In the case of detecting high pres-
sure, high sensitivity may not be required, but lower sensitivity
would be a better choice. For example, people want to monitor
the pulse signals to manage their physical health, but the weak
environmental noise may interfere in the accuracy of sen-
sors. This problem can be solved by modifying the sensitivity
to a suitable (lower) value, in which the weak environmental
stimuli could not produce an output signal. In view of the
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a 3 b 140
Vd=-60V Vd=-50V Vd=-40V Vg= -60V Vg= -50V Vg= -40V
Vd=-30V Vd=-20V Vd=-10V Vg= -30V Vg= -20V Vg= -10V
120

(I-I0)/I0 2

(I-I0)/I0
100

0.5 4

0.0 0
0 50 100 150 200 0 50 100 150 200
Time (Sec) Time (Sec)
c d 600
Vgs= -60 V Vds=-60 V
12

Sensitivity (KPa-1)
Sensitivity (KPa-1)

400 S=514 KPa-1

9

6 200

3
0
-60 -50 -40 -30 -20 -10 -60 -50 -40 -30 -20 -10
Vds (V) Vgs (V)

Figure 3.  a) By varying applied drain voltage, the relative change of drain current under 800 Pa with Vgs = −60 V. b) By varying applied gate voltage, the
relative change of drain current under 800 Pa with Vds = −60 V. c,d) The relationship of sensitivity to drain voltage (c) and gate voltage (d).

above statements, a sensor with tunable sensitivity via simple
way would be highly desirable, i.e., the sensitivity can be tuned
depending on the application requirement. However, the sen-
sitivity of most of reported sensors is difficult to tune once the
device is completed.
Here, we investigated the relationship of sensitivity to
voltage. In Figure 3a,b, the device was tested in a constant pres-
sure (800 Pa) by varying different voltage. The longer response/
recovery time compared to those in Figure 2f is due to the time
delay during the measurement of output current signal with
Keithley 4200 SCS. The responsive drain current shows obvious
dependence on voltage (Figure S9, Supporting Information).
When gate voltage is kept at −60 V, the relative change of cur-
rent ((I  −I0)/I0) increases as the drain voltage increases. On
the contrary, when the drain voltage is kept at −60 V, the rela-
tive change of current ((I −I0)/I0) decreases as the gate voltage
increases. Furthermore, the obtained sensitivities of device in
different voltage conditions are displayed in Figure 3c,d, and
Figures S10 and S11 in the Supporting Information, which
keep consistent with the abovementioned results. It can be
found that the sensitivity shows slight increase with the drain
voltage at fixed gate voltage (Figure 3c), while the gate voltage
may tune the sensitivity over a large range at fixed drain voltage
(Figure 3d).
In fact, this phenomenon stems from the difference of car-
rier’s transduction mechanism in various voltage conditions.
According to Equation (2), sensitivity intensively depends on
the relatively changed amount of drain current. When gate
bias is applied with −60 V, due to the high contact resistance
compared to channel resistance before applying pressure,
the initial drain current keeps at the same low level. With the
increasing of drain voltage, more charges that are induced by
gate voltage and accumulated at the channel flow into drain
electrode under the driving of drain voltage, which therefore
forms large source–drain current. This fact accounts for the
proportional relationship between sensitivity and drain voltage.
In addition, the contact resistance between electrodes and sem-
iconductor consists of Ohmic contact resistance and Schottky
barrier. The reduced Schottky barrier by increasing drain
voltage may further enhance the major role of Ohmic contact
resistance induced by microstructured electrodes. This effect
may synergistically benefit the sensitivity.
On the other hand, when the gate voltage decreases from
−60 to −10 V, device’s working state transfers from saturation
to subthreshold regime. As we all know, the gate voltage mod-
ulation effect in subthreshold regime was more intense than
that in saturation regime. In addition, the density of carriers
induced by gate in channel lowers rapidly during decreasing
gate voltage, and thus the base line of drain current (I0) without
pressure becomes smaller drastically. Therefore, the sensor
shows inverse proportional relationship between sensitivity and
gate voltage, and the variation range of sensitivity is also bigger
than that induced by drain voltage (Figure 3c,d).
This OFET-based pressure sensor is based on electrode/
semiconductor interface piezoresistive effect, so the fea-
ture of microstructure and semiconductor must have pro-
found impact on sensor’s performance. To investigate the
effect of microstructure’s features, we compared the perfor-
mance of several sets of sensors with the same pyramidical
shape but different sizes (9 µm × 9 µm, 14 µm × 14 µm, and

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23  µm × 23 µm) and different microstructure morphologies
(pyramidical shape, irregular shape with sharp peaks, prism-
like shape, and microrod shape). The SEM images of micro-
structures on PDMS electrodes are shown in Figures S12
and S13 in the Supporting Information. In Figure S12 in the
Supporting Information, it could be seen that the smaller the
pyramidical size, the higher the sensitivity of sensor. That is
because smaller size means larger density in the same area,
and more contact area would deform under the same pressure.
For different morphologies, the sharper the microstructure
in contact with semiconductor, the higher the sensitivity of
sensor (Figure S13, Supporting Information). This fact can be
understood as follows: the basic working principle of piezore-
sistive sensor is that the pressure induces the deformation of
active layer and thus changes the interface contact area, which
tunes the contact resistance and thus produces the sensing
signals. Therefore, sharp microstructure (micropyramid
shape) is more susceptible to extrusion deformation under
pressure, has large geometric deformation range, and thus
may produce large change in contact area, which leads to a big
contact resistance change and thus is beneficial for higher sen-
sitivity. In contrast, round microstructure (prism-like shape,
microrod shape) yields small deformation range under pres-
sure and can only produce a small resistance change range,
which directly leads to the low sensitivity in both low and high
pressure range.
In addition to microstructure’s features, the property of
semiconductor also affects the sensor’s performance. To prove
this point, classical pentacene was selected as the active layer
to fabricate contrastive sensor. Keeping the device parameters
identical, Figure S14 in the Supporting Information presents
the electrical performance of standard top-contact DNTT and
pentacene transistors and the sensitivities of DNTT and pen-
tacene-based sensors. Compared to DNTT-based sensor, the
pentacene-based sensor has an obviously lower sensitivity
(25 kPa−1; Figure S14c,f, Supporting Information). On the one
hand, lower mobility (0.02 cm2 V−1 s−1) of pentacene means
higher channel resistance, which could weaken the dominating
role of semiconductor/electrode interface contact resistance,
but on the other hand, DNTT-based transistor has a lower sub-
threshold slope (Figure S14b,e, Supporting Information), so the
drain current located in subthreshold regime is easier to modu-
late than pentacene-based sensor.
To verify the potential in practical applications, the sensor
was attached on author’s wrist to sense the different types of
muscle movement. When human’s wrist does different actions,
some specific muscle tissues would relax or shrink, which
causes the compression or release of the sensor attached on
the specific muscle skin and thus leads to sensing signals.
As shown in Figure  4a,b, when the wrist bended at different
angles (θ), the sensor could output responsive current signals.
Similarly, the sensor could also sensitively detect the twist
action of wrist (Figure 4c,d; Movie S3, Supporting Informa-
tion), which shows the potential in wearable devices.[58,59] In
modern life, health monitoring has been popular and impor-
tant to everyone because it can timely detect some signs of early
illness such as cardiovascular disease.[60] Pulse waves include
abundant cardiovascular physiological information. Herein, we
placed a flexible pressure sensor surrounding the wrist artery
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of a volunteer to detect pulse signals. To verify the advantage
of the tunable sensitivity of our sensor, we also tested the pulse
signals in different sensitivity state with the interference of
environmental vibration from instruments and/or air flow
from air conditioning. The sensor in higher sensitivity state
(Vg  =  −5 V, Vd  =  −20 V) obtained messy waveform of pulse
(Figure S15a, Supporting Information), while the perfect wave-
form was observed in relatively low sensitivity state (Vg = −20 V,
Vd = −20 V), i.e., the weak environment-disturbing stimulus is
filtered by the low sensitivity sensor (Figure 4e or Figure S15b,
Supporting Information). From the time-resolved sensing curve
in Figure 4e and inset, a series of radial artery pulse signals
were obtained with the frequency of 75 beats min−1 (Movie
S4, Supporting Information). As shown in Figure 4f, it can be
found that three feature signals (P1, P2, and P3) of pulse were
clearly distinguished. P1, P2, and P3 peaks represent percus-
sion wave, tidal wave, and diastolic wave, respectively. The ratio
of P2/P1 reflects arterial stiffness, which is highly related to
human health. By analyzing a series of pulse signal intensities,
the average value of P2/P1 is 0.65, which keeps consistent with
the 27-year-old volunteer’s health status.[61]
Furthermore, a device array of 5 × 5 pixels was fabricated to
test the ability of sensor to distinguish pressure distribution. A
drain/source electrodes array was prepared by depositing Au on
a 3 × 3 cm2 PDMS through shadow mask. Then, the PDMS
electrodes array was laminated on a 4 × 4 cm2 substrate. Drain/
source electrodes were extended by Au wire to the edge of
PDMS and scribbled by conductive silver paint to connect with
a measurement system. Figure S16 in the Supporting Informa-
tion shows the picture of the completed device array. The orig-
inal transfer curves of each transistor unit were measured to
obtain the base current without pressure. Subsequently, eight
screws were placed on the array (Figure 4g). By measuring the
transfer curves again under loading, the relative current change
((I − I0)/I0) was calculated to describe the pressure distribution.
Figure 4h reveals the calculating results and depicts the rela-
tive current change by different colors. The gray lattices present
the original state without pressure, light-blue lattices are the
places with one screw, and navy-blue lattices are the places with
two screws. From the colors reflected in Figure 4h, the pres-
sure sensor array precisely recognized the pressure distribution
induced by some screws arranged in a shape of English letter
“X.” This experiment indicates that our sensor can be used in
human−electronics interfaces and electronic skin devices that
require sensor array.
In summary, we successfully fabricated a novel pressure
sensor based on semiconductor/conductor interface piezore-
sistive effect in organic transistor, which merges the merits of
piezoresistive sensors and OFET-based sensors and thus pro-
duces a high sensitivity up to 514 kPa−1. More significantly,
the sensitivity of this sensor can be facilely tuned over wide
range just by adjusting the bias conditions, which is benefi-
cial for the application in complex pressure environment. The
demonstrative applications in monitoring the motion and pulse
of human body and in distinguishing the pressure distribution
strongly verified the practical potential in wearable electronics.
More importantly, this sensor provides a novel principle of
tuning the contact resistance between drain/source electrodes
and semiconductor in transistor to sense stimuli, which makes
© 2018 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim
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Figure 4.  a,c) The schematic diagram of wrist bend and twist at different angles, respectively. b,d) The corresponding output current signals to muscle move-
ment of wrist bend and twist. e,f) Electrical signals and its enlarged view induced by radial artery pulse, the inset shows that author was measuring pulse sig-
nals. g) The pressure sensor array was pressed by some screws arranged in a shape of English letter “X.” h) Pressure distribution recognized by sensor array.

it a promising way for developing high-performance pressure
sensors and even more complex applications.
Experimental Section
Preparation of the PDMS Electrode: The liquid PDMS mixture consisted
of base and cross-linker with weight ratio of 10:1 (Dow Corning Sylgard
184). After stirring the mixture for 30 min, it was placed in vacuum
oven to degas. Then, the PDMS was dropped onto silicon mold with
inversed pyramid arrays and spin-coated at 1200 rpm for 40 s. After
curing at 70 °C on hotplate for 2 h, it was peeled off carefully and
attached on silicon wafer with pyramid structure upward. The thickness
of PDMS was about 50 µm. To enhance the adhesion between PDMS
and Au, the pyramidical side of PDMS was first treated by oxygen
plasma (100 W, 30 s) to produce hydroxyl groups, and then modified
with (3-Mercaptopropyl)trimethoxysilane (purchased from Aldrich)
in vacuum oven for 1 h at room temperature. Finally, 50 nm Au was

Adv. Mater. 2018, 1805630 1805630  (8 of 10) © 2018 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim
www.advancedsciencenews.com
deposited on PDMS through a shadow mask at a rate of 0.05 Å s−1 under
10−4  Pa in vacuum thermal evaporation system; the channel length and
channel width were 25 and 6000 µm, respectively.
Device Fabrication and Measurements: The gate electrode and insulator
were made of highly doped silicon wafer and 300 nm SiO2, respectively.
(For flexible sensor, Polyimide film was used as substrate, and 30 nm Al
film was deposited as gate electrode.) After treatment with O2 plasma
at 150 W for 3 min, fluoropolymer Cytop (CTL-809M, diluted to 5% by
mixing with CT-Solv.180) was spin-coated on SiO2 (or Al film for flexible
sensor) at 4000 rpm for 20 s and annealed on hotplate at 100 °C for
30 min, and 180 nm Cytop buffer layer was obtained. Then, DNTT was
deposited on Cytop with a thickness of 20 nm at a rate of 0.1 Å s−1
under 10−4  Pa in vacuum thermal evaporation system, and substrate
temperature was kept at room temperature. Through laminating it with
PDMS electrode, the OFET-based pressure sensor was completed. The
electrical property of pressure sensor was characterized by the joint
use of Keithley 4200-SCS, force gauge (MARK-10, M5-012) and stepper
motor.
Supporting Information
Supporting Information is available from the Wiley Online Library or
from the author.
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to the National Key Research and Development
Program (Grant No. 2016YFB0401100), the National Natural Science
Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 21573277, 51503221, and 51633006),
the Key Research Program of Frontier Sciences of Chinese Academy
of Sciences (Grant No. QYZDB−SSW−SLH031), and the Natural
Foundation of Sciences of Jiangsu Province (Grant No. BK20150368).
The volunteer took part in these experiments following informed
consent; the experiments described here did not require ethical approval
by the authors’ institutes.
Conflict of Interest
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Keywords
field-effect, piezoresistive effect, pressure sensors, transistors, tunable
sensitivity
Received: August 29, 2018
Revised: November 9, 2018
Published online:
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