Study of triboelectric potential for tunable contact-electrification field effect transistors

Tribotronics is an original field studying the coupling between triboelectricity and semiconductors. Contactelectrification field effect transistors (CE-FET) have emerged as promising tribotronic devices capable of implementing novel electromechanical devices for human/robot interfacing, sensing platforms and active, flexible electronics in the near future. This work presents the design, fabrication, and characterisation CE-FETs consisting of a triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) – using zinc oxide (ZnO) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) as tribo-positive and tribonegative materials, respectively, coupled to a driven metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistor (MOSFET). Optimising the triboelectric properties of selected materials, and operating TENG with frequencies ranging between 210 Hz, and electrode distances ranging from 2-10 mm, the modulation of the output characteristics of the MOSFET via external mechanical forces has been demonstrated.