Reliability of transparent conducting substrates for rollable displays: A cyclic loading investigation

Abstract

Abstract— Failure mechanisms for flexible conducting substrates are investigated herein in the context of rollable/flexible display applications. Cyclic loading experiments (substrates subjected to multiple cycles of tensile strain) were carried out on both ITO‐coated PET and PEDOT:PSS‐coated PET substrates. The resistance was measured after each bending cycle. The resistance increased with the number of cycles and was not reversible. Even when the tensile strain on the ITO/PET was below the virgin cracking threshold (∼2%) previously reported [ Appl Phys Lett 76 , 1425 (2000)], slight increases in resistance were measurable after just a few cycles.