  In organic field effect transistors (FETs), charges move near the surface of
an organic semiconductor, at the interface with a dielectric. In the past, the
nature of the microscopic motion of charge carriers -that determines the device
performance- has been related to the quality of the organic semiconductor.
Recently, it has been appreciated that also the nearby dielectric has an
unexpectedly strong influence. The mechanisms responsible for this influence
are not understood. To investigate these mechanisms we have studied transport
through organic single crystal FETs with different gate insulators. We find
that the temperature dependence of the mobility evolves from metallic-like to
insulating-like with increasing the dielectric constant of the insulator. The
phenomenon is accounted for by a two-dimensional Frohlich polaron model that
quantitatively describes our observations and shows that increasing the
dielectric polarizability results in a crossover from the weak to the strong
polaronic coupling regime.
