A butterfly shaped orange–red thermally activated delayed fluorescent (TADF) emitter, named ACFO, is developed by integrating electron-donating (D) 9,9-dimethyl-9,10-dihydroacridine units into γ-positions of an electron-accepting (A) fluorenone core to form a D-A-D configuration. ACFO emits intense orange–red light peaking at 600 nm in toluene solution, which is significantly red-shifted compared with its benzophenone-based counterpart. Imparted with a small singlet–triplet splitting energy of 0.13 eV, ACFO exhibits distinct TADF feature with a short delayed fluorescent lifetime of 3.8 μs and displays a moderate photoluminescence quantum yield of 31%. Consequently, employing ACFO as an emitter results in orange–red organic light-emitting diodes that exhibit a maximum external quantum efficiency of nearly 11%, corresponding to a nearly 100% exciton utilization efficiency in electroluminescence process. Our finding demonstrates for the first time that fluorenone derivatives can be employed as TADF emitters for high-efficiency fluorescent organic light-emitting diodes.
Molecular orientations and energy levels at organic interfaces are critical knowledge in guiding materials selections in organic electronic device design. The correlation between molecular orientations and the energy levels when two different molecules are placed in contact with each other is discussed. Several combinations of different organic semiconducting molecules are investigated here with a broad range of structures. In-situ ultraviolet photoemission spectroscopy (UPS) is used to directly probe the energy levels at the molecular interfaces.
This talk will discuss recent experiments designed to study the formation of excitons and their subsequent diffusions in OLEDs. These experimental results suggest that contrary to conventional wisdom, host singlet exciton diffusion can occur over long distances, while host triplet excitons are confined close to the exciton formation region for the archetype host and hole transport layer CBP. The exciton formation mechanism is studied and we show that the ratio of excitons formed on the host to excitons formed on the dopant varies strongly with the applied voltage. Refinements to models of efficiency roll off are discussed in light of the improved understanding of exciton formation and we suggest design guidelines to improve efficiency by engineering exciton formation.
Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) have already been proven in display applications and show promise as the next-generation solid-state lighting technology for general illumination. A major barrier to the adoption of OLEDs for solid-state lighting is the efficiency roll-off at high brightness, which occurs at much lower current densities for OLEDs than their inorganic counterparts, in large part due to the quenching of excitons. We discuss strategies to mitigate this efficiency roll-off through management of excitons in both white and monochrome devices, including the use of phosphorescent as well as thermally activated delayed fluorescent emitters. Successful high-efficiency devices are used as case studies for how to effectively manage excitons.
We have studied the effects of incorporating phosphorescent sensitizers into fluorescent organic-light emitting diode (OLED) devices. In the emissive layer of this system, the host material is co-doped at low concentrations with both a phosphorescent and a fluorescent dye. The purpose of the phosphorescent dopant is to capture both singlet and triplet excitons from the host material and to transfer them into the singlet state of the fluorescent dye. Ideally, recombination of excitons and the emission of light would occur solely on the fluorescent dye. This sensitized fluorescent system can potentially achieve 100% internal quantum efficiency as both triplet and singlet states are being harvested. We have observed an almost two-fold improvement in the quantum efficiency of a sensitized fluorescent system, utilizing rubrene as the fluorescent dye and Ir(ppy)2(acac) as the sensitizer, versus a standard rubrene-based host-guest system. By testing various dopant concentrations, the optimal emissive layer composition for this system was determine to be ~2 wt.% rubrene and ~7 wt.% Ir(ppy)2(acac) in a CBP host.
Organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs) show potential as the next generation solid state lighting technology. A major barrier to widespread adoption at this point is the efficiency droop that occurs for OLEDs at practical brightness (~ 5000 cd/m2) levels necessary for general lighting. We highlight recent progress in highly efficient OLEDs at high brightness, where improvements are made by managing excitons in these devices through rational device design. General design principles for monochrome OLEDs are discussed based on recent device architectures that have been successfully implemented. We expect that an improved understanding of exciton dynamics in OLEDs in combination with innovative device design will drive future development.
Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) show potential as the next-generation solid-state lighting technology. A major barrier to widespread adoption at this point is the efficiency droop that occurs for OLEDs at practical brightness (∼5000 cd/m2) levels necessary for general lighting. We highlight recent progress in highly efficient OLEDs at high brightness, where improvements are made by managing excitons in these devices through rational device design. General design principles for both white and monochrome OLEDs are discussed based on recent device architectures that have been successfully implemented. We expect that an improved understanding of exciton dynamics in OLEDs in combination with innovative device design will drive future development.
Organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs) have progressed significantly over the last two decades. For years, OLEDs have been promoted as the next generation technology for flat panel displays and solid-state lighting due to their potential for high energy efficiency and dynamic range of colors. Although high efficiency can readily be obtained at low brightness levels, a significant decline at high brightness is commonly observed. In this report, we will review various strategies for achieving highly efficient phosphorescent OLED devices at high luminance. Specifically, we will provide details regarding the performance and general working principles behind each strategy. We will conclude by looking at how some of these strategies can be combined to produce high efficiency white OLEDs at high brightness.
Significant development has been made on phosphorescent organic light emitting diodes (PHOLEDs) over
the past decade, which eventually resulted in the commercialization of widely distributed active-matrix organic light
emitting diode displays for mobile phones. However, higher efficiency PHOLEDs are still needed to further reduce
the cost and lower the power consumption for general lighting and LED backlight applications. In particular, red
PHOLEDs currently have in general the lowest efficiencies among the three primary colors, due most likely to the
energy-gap law. Therefore, a number of groups have of made use of various device configurations, including
insertion of a carrier blocking or exciton confining layer, doping the transport layers, as well as employing multiple
emissive zone structures to improve the device efficiency. However, these approaches are rather inconvenient for
commercial applications. In this work, we have developed a simpler way to boost the performance of red PHOLEDs
by incorporating an exciton harvesting green emitter, which transfers a large portion of the energy to the co-deposited
red emitter. A high external quantum efficiency (EQE) of 20.6% was achieved, which is among the best
performances for red PHOLEDs.
The development of high performance organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs) for display and lighting
applications has attracted considerable research interest from both academia and industry. In this work, the
designs of simplified phosphorescent OLEDs with exceptionally high efficiency are discussed. It is found
that discrete blocking layers and a double emission zone are unnecessary to achieve high efficiency in
optimized phosphorescent OLEDs. Due to the elimination of these redundant layers, the device structure can
be highly simplified. It is also shown that single-layer, two organic component devices are feasible with
state-of-the-art efficiency.
A major barrier to commercial adoption of organic light emitting diode (OLED) based devices is
their often unacceptably fast rate of degradation. Typically, to estimate device lifetime, electrical
parameters such as driving voltage and luminance are periodically measured while constant
current is applied to the OLED. Due to the repetitive nature and long timescales involved in
lifetime testing, the procedure is an ideal candidate for automation. An automated lifetimetesting
system and accompanying software was developed to simultaneously drive multiple
OLED devices and collect lifetime parameters while the entire system is under ultra-high
vacuum conditions. The system is connected to a larger vacuum chamber so that devices can be
synthesized and then analyzed in situ without exposure to atmosphere. The system was
developed with the aim of facilitating rapid discovery and understanding of OLED degradation
mechanisms.
Non-blocking Phosphorescent Organic Light Emitting Diode (NB-PHOLED) is a highly simplified device structure that
has achieved record high device performance on chlorinated ITO[1], flexible substrates[2], also with Pt based
phosphorescent dopants[3] and NB-PHOLED has significantly reduced efficiency roll-off[4]. The principle novel
features of NB-PHOLED is the absence of blocking layer in the OLED stack, as well as the absence of organic hole
injection layer, this allows for reduction of carrier accumulation in between organic layers and result in higher
efficiencies.
This paper presents our research and development efforts in realizing and perfecting organic/inorganic photon
upconversion devices for wavelengths from near infrared (1.5 μm) region to visible light (green). The basic idea is to
integrate an InGaAs/InP photodetector with an organic light emitting diode (OLED), connected in series. The detected
photocurrent drives the OLED to emit visible light, thereby achieving the wavelength conversion. We have adopted new
strategies to improve the external device efficiency, including insertion of an embedded mirror and integration of a
heterojunction phototransistor (HPT) and an OLED. As a result, infrared optical upconversion is demonstrated at room
temperature with a built-in electrical gain of 15 from the HPT and an external upconversion efficiency that is improved
by one order of magnitude.
Fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) and aluminum doped zinc oxide (AZO) were systematically investigated as alternatives
to indium tin oxide (ITO) for canonical poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) + [6,6]-phenyl-C61 butyric acid methyl ester
(PCBM) polymer bulk heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells. Devices made with FTO performed twice as well as devices
made with ITO, establishing FTO as a suitable, low-cost ITO replacement. Ozone treatment was shown to be a critical
enabling element for both FTO and AZO. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and device characteristics were used
to explain the effect of ozone treatment and the origin of open circuit voltage.
The band alignment at metal-organic interfaces has been extensively studied; however the electrodes in real devices
often consist of metals modified with dielectric buffer layers. We demonstrate that interface dipole theory, originally
developed to describe Schottky contacts at metal-semiconductor interfaces, can also accurately describe the injection
barriers in real organic electronic devices (i.e, at
electrode-organic interface). It is found that theoretically predicted
hole injection barriers for various archetype metal-organic and
metal-dielectric-organic structures are in excellent
agreement with values extracted from experimental measurements.
This paper presents our research and development efforts in realizing and perfecting organic/inorganic photon
upconversion devices for wavelengths from near infrared (1.5 μm) region to visible light (green). The basic idea is to
integrate an InGaAs/InP photodetector with an organic light emitting diode (OLED), connected in series. The detected
photocurrent drives the OLED to emit visible light, thereby achieving the upconversion. A few approaches of integration
methods and device designs have been tested.
Fullerene (C60) has been found to form a universal hole injection interface in the Metal/C60 anode structure. This bilayer structure opens up possibilities to select various highly conductive metals as anodes to replace indium tin oxide (ITO).
Organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs) utilizing Au/C60 and Mg/C60 bilayer anodes were fabricated.
Electroluminescence (EL) efficiencies of devices with Au/C60 anodes surpassed the ITO baseline device by ~ 25%. It was found that the hole injection current for the Au/C60 anode can be tuned via the C60 interlayer thickness in the range of 1 - 5 nm. Single carrier
hole-only (HO) devices with different metal and metal/C60 bilayer anodes were studied. With
the insertion of a 3 nm thick C60 buffer layer between the anode metal and hole transport layer (HTL), an increase in hole
injection current of more than two orders was realized. Based on device modeling we extracted C60-induced dipoles on
the metal surfaces. These dipole values agree well with values obtained by Kelvin probe and photoemission
measurements. What is more, the dipole values effectively pin the work function of all metals to a common value of ~ 4.6 eV, creating a universal hole injection barrier regardless of the pristine anode metal work function.
CuPc:C60 Organic-Fullerene composites together with metals such as Au are found to form efficient hole injection structures for organic light-emitting diodes. C60 concentration of 30 wt.% yielded optimum device characteristics including low driving voltage, high current efficiency, and high thermal stability. In the case of Au/CuPc:C60 anode structure, extremely high current efficiency of ~ 8.7 cd/A and low operating voltage (i.e. 20 mA/cm2 at ~8V) has been achieved in a simple bi-layer device using Alq as emitter. Through a study on single carrier devices, the versatility of the composite injection structure is attributed to that C60 in the composite layer facilitate hole transfer from the metals to the composite whereas CuPc facilitate hole transport and transfer to a hole transport layer.
A novel anode structure comprising a nanocomposite and metal, has enabled highly efficient and stable superluminescent organic light-emitting diodes (SOLED). For C545T singlet green emitter, SOLED can reach 33 cd/A at 1000 cd/m2, doubled the efficiency as comparing to conventional devices with ITO/CuPc structure. More importantly, the SOLED can still hold 24 cd/A at 50000 cd/m2, indicating a highly efficient hole injection capability at ultra-high brightness. In addition, the simulated electronluminescent spectra with angle dependence, agree with experimental results. It is expected that SOLED might find wide applications, not only in display but in general lighting or ultra-high brightness application, by replacing the problematic ITO anode.
Single nanometer-thick layers of crystalline silicon (c-Si) confined by amporphouse SiO2 have been prepared from silicon-on-insulator wafers. The photoluminescence from these ultra-thin quantum wells shows an increase in peak energy with decreasing c-Si layer thickness. Comparison with experimental results for the c-Si band gap and also with theory shows that the increase in photoluminescence peak energy is not as rapid as the measured or predicted energy gap. This difference is attributed to recombination of confined electron-hole pairs at the c-Si/SiO2 interface rather than within the quantum well.
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