Electrical Characteristics of GaAs Nanowire-Based MESFETs on Flexible Plastics

GaAs nanowire (NW)-based metal-semiconductor field-effect transistors (MESFETs) were constructed on flexible plastic substrates by a conventional top-down approach. The top-down approach utilized in this paper combines photolithography of high-quality GaAs bulk wafers with anisotropic chemical etching processes for preparation of GaAs NWs and photolithographic processes for formation of metal electrodes. For a representative GaAs NW-based MESFET, peak transconductance, the I
_on
/I
_off
ratio, and the subthreshold slope are estimated to be approximately 19.7 S, ~10
⁷
, and ~100 mV/dec, respectively. The electrical characteristics of the GaAs NW-based MESFETs were maintained during 3000 times of bending cycles under maximal tensile strains of 0.77% and 1.02%. These results demonstrate the possibility of using these devices in high-speed and high-performance flexible electronics.