Howard Katz

About

Howard Katz is a professor of materials science and engineering at Johns Hopkins University, with a joint appointment in the Department of Chemistry at the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences. He is a pioneer in the fields of organic electronics and photonics, with research interests that include organic/hybrid materials, organic semiconductors, photonic polymers, conjugated compounds, molecular recognition, self-assembly, fabrication approaches, high-field devices, chemical sensing, energy conversion, and logic devices. Katz established the structural, physical, and synthetic organic chemical principles for several material classes, including molecular semiconductors and nonlinear optical polymers, guiding their development from scientific discovery to widespread application. He was the first to report the value and methodology of organic semiconductor syntheses that avoid impurities responsible for heterogeneity, and introduced rigid, strongly assembling electron donor subunits that are now key components in conducting polymers and printable organic semiconductors. Katz also promoted the idea that the combination of material properties and device architecture in organic field-effect transistors is highly suited for chemical detection, publishing the first paper on this application. His recent work focuses on charge carrier density at organic semiconductor-dielectric interfaces, biosensor and vapor sensor performance enhancements, and the use of static-charged polymer…

Research topics

• Materials science
• Optoelectronics
• Chemistry
• Nanotechnology
• Chemical engineering

Selected publications

• Ultrasensitive Detection of Electrolyte Leakage from Lithium-Ion Batteries by Ionically Conductive Metal-Organic Frameworks

  Matter · 2020-06-25 · 90 citations

  articleOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Synergistically Improved Molecular Doping and Carrier Mobility by Copolymerization of Donor–Acceptor and Donor–Donor Building Blocks for Thermoelectric Application

  Advanced Functional Materials · 2020-08-16 · 81 citations

  article

  Abstract In this work, it is demonstrated that random copolymerization is a simple but effective strategy to obtain new conductive copolymers as high‐performance thermoelectric materials. By using a polymerizing acceptor unit diketopyrropyrrole with donor units thienothiophene and oligo ethylene glycol substituted bithiophene (g 3 2T), it is found that strong interchain donor–acceptor interactions ensure good film crystallinity for charge transport, while donor–donor type building blocks contrib…

  PublisherDOI

• Dichlorinated Dithienylethene‐Based Copolymers for Air‐Stable n‐Type Conductivity and Thermoelectricity

  Advanced Functional Materials · 2020-10-23 · 70 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Abstract Two donor–acceptor (D–A) polymers are obtained by coupling difluoro‐ and dichloro‐substituted forms of the electron‐deficient unit BDOPV and the relatively weak donor moiety dichlorodithienylethene (ClTVT). The conductivity and power factors of doped devices are different for the chlorinated and fluorinated BDOPV polymers. A high electron conductivity of 38.3 and 16.1 S cm −1 are obtained from the chlorinated and fluorinated polymers with N‐DMBI, respectively, and 12.4 and 2.4 S cm −1 a…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Blended Conjugated Host and Unconjugated Dopant Polymers Towards N‐type All‐Polymer Conductors and High‐ZT Thermoelectrics

  Angewandte Chemie International Edition · 2023-04-06 · 38 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Abstract N‐Type thermoelectrics typically consist of small molecule dopant+polymer host. Only a few polymer dopant+polymer host systems have been reported, and these have lower thermoelectric parameters. N‐type polymers with high crystallinity and order are generally used for high‐conductivity ( ) organic conductors. Few n‐type polymers with only short‐range lamellar stacking for high‐conductivity materials have been reported. Here, we describe an n‐type short‐range lamellar‐stacked all‐polymer…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Enhancing Electrical Conductivity and Power Factor in Poly‐Glycol‐Bithienylthienothiophene with Oligoethylene Glycol Side Chains Through Tris (pentafluorophenyl) Borane Doping

  Advanced Functional Materials · 2024-04-13 · 17 citations

  articleSenior authorCorresponding

  Abstract Doping of organic semiconductors has served as an effective method to achieve high electrical conductivity and large thermoelectric power factor. This is of importance to the development of flexible/wearable electronics and green energy‐harvesting technologies. The doping impact of the Lewis acid tris (pentafluorophenyl) borane (BCF) on the thermoelectric performance of poly(2‐(4,4′‐bis(2‐methoxyethoxy)‐5′‐methyl‐[2,2′‐bithiophen]‐5‐yl)‐5‐methylthieno[3,2‐b]thiophene (pgBTTT), a thiophe…

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• SENSORS: Maximization of Electronic Sensitivity and Selectivity of Organic Semiconductors Through Complexation and Film Architecture

  NSF · $240k · 2005–2008

• EXP-LA: IMPACT (Imprinted Polymer Array for Counterterrorism):

  NSF · $800k · 2007–2011

• P-N Interface Probing and Design for Organic/Hybrid Photovoltaics and Circuit Components

  NSF · $350k · 2008–2012

Frequent coauthors

• Andrew J. Lovinger

  48 shared

• M. L. Schilling

  47 shared

• Ananth Dodabalapur

  The University of Texas at Austin

  46 shared

• Wei Shi

  Shanghai University

  42 shared

• Zhenan Bao

  37 shared

• Junsheng Yu

  University of Electronic Science and Technology of China

  33 shared

• Byung Jun Jung

  Samsung (South Korea)

  30 shared

• Josué F. Martínez Hardigree

  University of Oxford

  28 shared

Awards & honors

• National Academy of Inventors (2017)
• two R&D 100 Awards

Similar researchers at Johns Hopkins University

• Hai-Quan Maoh-86
• Kalina Hristovah-52
• Jonah Erlebacherh-50