Organic field-effect transistors (OFETs) are fabricated by inkjet printing using bacterial cellulose (BC) and derivatives both as substrate and gate dielectric. Inkjet printing of electronics permits low cost and large area fabrication and it is compatible with flexible substrates, such as BC. In this work, BC based materials are investigated as innovative materials to be used in organic electronics fabrication. BC is a pure substance, biodegradable and renewable. It is stable up to 260 °C, and it has a low coefficient of thermal expansion (0.1-6 ppm/°C). Its dielectric constant is in the range of k = 1.6 − 1.9. BC properties compare well with the commonly used substrate materials (poly(ethylene naphtalate) (PEN) and poly(ethylene terephtalate) (PET). The BC used was obtained by biosynthesis by the bacteria Glucanacetobacter xylinus.

The OFETs are fabricated using inkjet-printed silver gate and source-drain electrodes. A chitosan-bacterial cellulose composite deposited by spin-coating, is used as dielectric. Inkjet-printed poly(9,9-dioctylfuorene-co-bithiophene) (F8T2) is used as semiconductor. All the fabrication processes were performed using a maximum temperature of 150 °C at ambient air.
The performance and stability of ink-jet fabricated OFETs are compared with those of similar OFETs fabricated using traditional fabrication methods, namely, thermal evaporation of electrodes and spin-coating of the semiconductor.