White Organic Light Emitting Diodes

Die vorliegende Arbeit beschäftigt sich mit drei Ansätzen der hocheffizienten Erzeugung von weißem Licht mit organischen Leuchtdioden (OLEDs) auf der Basis kleiner Moleküle. Ein Ansatz kombiniert die Emission eines fluoreszenten und zweier phosphoreszenter Emitter in einer einzelnen Emissionsschicht. Da das Triplettniveau des verwendeten Blauemitters niedriger ist als die Triplettniveaus der phosphoreszenten Emitter, werden die Konzentrationen der Emitter so gewählt, dass ein Exzitonenübertrag zwischen ihnen unterbunden wird. Die strahlungslose Rekombination von Tripletts auf dem fluoreszenten Blauemitter begrenzt die Effizienz dieses Ansatzes, jedoch besticht die resultierende weiße OLED durch eine bemerkenswerte Farbstabilität. Der zweite Ansatz basiert auf dem “Triplet Harvesting” Konzept. Ansonsten ungenutzte Triplett Exzitonen werden von einem fluoreszenten Blauemitter auf phosphoreszente Emitter übertragen, wodurch interne Quanteneffizienzen bis zu 100 % möglich sind. Der zur Verfügung stehende Blauemitter 4P-NPD erlaubt aufgrund seines niedrigen Triplettniveaus nicht den Triplett übertrag auf einen grünen Emitter. Daher wird das “Triplet Harvesting” auf zwei unterschiedliche phosphoreszente Emitter, anhand des gelben Emitters Ir(dhfpy)2acac und des roten Emitters Ir(MDQ)2acac untersucht. Es wird gezeigt, dass beide phosphoreszente Emitter indirekt durch Exzitonendiffusion angeregt werden und nicht durch direkte Rekombination von Ladungsträgern auf den Emittermolekülen. Eine genaue Justage der Anregungsverteilung zwischen den phosphoreszenten Emittern ist durch Schichtdickenvariation in der Größenordnung üblicher Schichtdicken möglich. Spätere Produktionsanlagen brauchen daher keinen speziellen Genauigkeitsanforderungen gerecht zu werden. Der dritte und zugleich erfolgreichste Ansatz beruht auf einer Weiterentwicklung des zweiten Ansatzes. Er besteht zunächst darin den Tripletttransfer auf den Übertrag von einem fluoreszenten blauen auf einen phosphoreszenten roten Emitter zu beschränken. Die sich ergebende spektrale Lücke wird durch direktes Prozessieren einer unabhängigen voll phosphoreszenten OLED auf diese erste OLED gefüllt. Verbunden sind beide OLEDs durch eine ladungsträgererzeugende Schicht, in welcher durch das angelegte Feld Elektron/Loch-Paare getrennt werden. Dieser Aufbau entspricht elektrisch der Reihenschaltung zweier OLEDs, welche im Rahmen dieser Arbeit individuell untersucht und optimiert werden. Dabei ergibt sich, dass die Kombination von zwei verschiedenen phosphoreszenten Emittern in einer gemeinsamen Matrix die Ladungsträgerbalance in der Emissionszone sowie die Quanteneffizienz der vollphosphoreszenten OLED stark verbessert. Als Ergebnis steht eine hocheffiziente weiße OLED, welche durch die ausgewogene Emission von vier verschiedenen Emittern farbstabiles Licht mit warm weißen Farbkoordinaten (x, y) = (0.462, 0.429) und ausgezeichneten Farbwiedergabeeigenschaften (CRI = 80.1) erzeugt. Dabei sind die mit diesem Ansatz erreichten Lichtausbeuten (hv = 90.5 lm/W) mit denen von voll phosphoreszenten OLEDs vergleichbar

Luminescence in sulfides : a rich history and a bright future

Sulfide-based luminescent materials have attracted a lot of attention for a wide range of photo-, cathodo- and electroluminescent applications. Upon doping with Ce3+ and Eu2+, the luminescence can be varied over the entire visible region by appropriately choosing the composition of the sulfide host. Main application areas are flat panel displays based on thin film electroluminescence, field emission displays and ZnS-based powder electroluminescence for backlights. For these applications, special attention is given to BaAl2S4:Eu, ZnS:Mn and ZnS:Cu. Recently, sulfide materials have regained interest due to their ability (in contrast to oxide materials) to provide a broad band, Eu2+-based red emission for use as a color conversion material in white-light emitting diodes (LEDs). The potential application of rare-earth doped binary alkaline-earth sulfides, like CaS and SrS, thiogallates, thioaluminates and thiosilicates as conversion phosphors is discussed. Finally, this review concludes with the size-dependent luminescence in intrinsic colloidal quantum dots like PbS and CdS, and with the luminescence in doped nanoparticles

Photophysics of Thermally-Activated Delayed Fluorescence Emitters and its Impact on the Performance of Organic Light-Emitting Diodes

Research in thermally-activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) emitters is gathering momentum and rapidly progressing towards commercial application in display industry. Successful TADF combines design strategies that result in thermal up-conversion of nonemissive triplets into emissive singlet excitons, increasing the maximum internal efficiency from 25 to 100 % in purely organic systems. Its performance can therefore compete with current leading emitters used in industry, however it is not without its hurdles and a full understanding of how to produce efficient TADF systems and stable organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) is still elusive. This thesis aims at illuminating strategies to achieve highly efficient and stable TADF. By examining the photophysical aspects of different donor-acceptor systems (D-A, D2-A, D3- A, D4-A and D-A-D) and, more importantly, establishing comparisons between different subsets of molecules, subtle but important aspects of the performance of these emitters are isolated to allow understanding of future design rules for better combinations. These comparisons are then correlated with the emitters’ performance in devices. In a multi-donor platform, the inherent TADF mechanism and in host are both considered by comparing the effect of number and position of donors as well as rigidity and polarity of the host environment to the D-A angles. A separate comparative study elucidates the real heavy atom effect in an emitter with dual emission from two different conformations. Furthermore, the application of a well-established spectroscopy technique novel to TADF tests its physical mechanism by probing character and mixing of the excited states involved. Finally, in a more application-driven approach, a combination of three different TADF molecules for the production of white light is studied in simple device structures. In this sense, guidelines of how to produce optimised TADF systems emerge, moving the technology ever close to its industrial application

Characterization and reliability of blue and white GaN-based LEDs submitted to current and thermal stress

The aim of this thesis work is to analyze reliability of blue and white GaN-based commercial LEDs. Reliability is indeed one of the key factors for devices success in the market of lighting solutions. Temperature and driving current are the main causes of degradation of LEDs. In order to understand the degradation mechanisms of these devices two types of stresses have been carried out, current and thermal stress and pure thermal stress, and electrical, optical and thermal measurements have been performed. The results obtained at the end of this work show several types of degradation mechanisms which influence LEDs both electrical and optical properties / Caratterizzazione e affidabilità di LED blu e bianchi basati su nitruro di gallio sottoposti a stress in corrente ed in temperatur

2014 Status Report on Organic Light Emitting Diodes (OLED)

Organic light emitting diodes (OLED) are promising candidates for general illumination, since they offer the possibility to realize large area light sources which can even be transparent and flexible. The energy-saving potential of OLEDs is similar to that of LEDs, but the two technologies differ in a number of ways. The present report introduces the basics of the OLED technologies and its latest developments. It also describe the emerging markets, industry landscape and standardisation requirementsJRC.F.7-Renewables and Energy Efficienc

Doped and non-doped organic light-emitting diodes based on a yellow carbazole emitter into a blue-emitting matrix

A new carbazole derivative with a 3,3'-bicarbazyl core 6,6'-substituted by dicyanovinylene groups (6,6'-bis(1-(2,2'-dicyano)vinyl)-N,N'-dioctyl-3,3'-bicarbazyl; named (OcCz2CN)2, was synthesized by carbonyl-methylene Knovenagel condensation, characterized and used as a component of multilayer organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). Due to its -donor-acceptor type structure, (OcCz2CN)2 was found to emit a yellow light at max=590 nm (with the CIE coordinates x=0.51; y = 0.47) and was used either as a dopant or as an ultra-thin layer in a blue-emitting matrix of 4,4'-bis(2,2'-diphenylvinyl)-1,1'-biphenyl (DPVBi). DPVBi (OcCz2CN)2-doped structure exhibited, at doping ratio of 1.5 weight %, a yellowish-green light with the CIE coordinates (x = 0.31; y = 0.51), an electroluminescence efficiency EL=1.3 cd/A, an external quantum efficiency ext= 0.4 % and a luminance L= 127 cd/m2 (at 10 mA/cm2) whereas for non-doped devices utilizing the carbazolic fluorophore as a thin neat layer, a warm white with CIE coordinates (x = 0.40; y= 0.43), EL= 2.0 cd/A, ext= 0.7 %, L = 197 cd/m2 (at 10 mA/cm2) and a color rendering index (CRI) of 74, were obtained. Electroluminescence performances of both the doped and non-doped devices were compared with those obtained with 5,6,11,12-tetraphenylnaphtacene (rubrene) taken as a reference of highly efficient yellow emitter

An investigation into novel red emitting phosphors and their applications

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.New red emitting phosphors, based on the double tungstate/molybdates, were discovered. Some were able to retain their luminous efficacy after substituting Y3+ for Eu3+, reducing the cost of the phosphor. This substitution was attempted for existing commercial red emitting phosphors and proved unsuccessful. Another set of phosphors based on these lattices were discovered and the emitted luminous efficacy was 140% greater than other reported Eu3+ phosphors. The best of these was Na2WO4MoO4Eu0.44Al1.34Sm0.011. The integration of phosphors to the lighting application was also studied, including improvements in light extraction for existing phosphors. ACEL panels are currently applied to many applications and were briefly examined. The more recent OLED technology was investigated and comparisons can be drawn with the ACEL panels. LEDs were also a focus of the work with a new method developed for remote application of phosphors to LEDs, based on a dome shaped encapsulant, and this was adopted commercially by a high brightness LED manufacturer. The studies on the phosphors reported herein were aimed at integrating these into commercial applications. Although this was not achieved as brightness and particles size were problematic, if it is demonstrated that further development of the synthetic methods produce phosphors with suitable attributes, this may lead to the integration in applications.Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), Enfis, the Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) and the Technology Strategy Board (TSB

Quantum Dot-Based Light Emitting Diodes (QDLEDs): New Progress

In recent years, the display industry has progressed rapidly. One of the most important developments is the ability to build flexible, transparent and very thin displays by organic light emitting diode (OLED). Researchers working on this field try to improve this area more and more. It is shown that quantum dot (QD) can be helpful in this approach. In this chapter, writers try to consider all the studies performed in recent years about quantum dot-based light emitting diodes (QDLEDs) and conclude how this nanoparticle can improve performance of QDLEDs. In fact, the existence of quantum dots in QDLEDs can cause an excellent improvement in their efficiency and lifetime resulted from using improved active layer by colloidal nanocrystals. Finally, the recent progresses on the quantum dot-based light emitting diodes are reviewed in this chapter, and an important outlook into challenges ahead is prepared

Colloidal quantum dot hybrids: an emerging class of materials for ambient lighting

The rapid growth of the global economy and urbanization have resulted in major worldwide issues such as greenhouse gas emission, air pollution and the energy crisis. Artificial ambient light is one of the greatest inventions in human history, but it is also one of the primary energy consumption constituents and a focus of the global grand energy challenge. Therefore, low cost and low energy consumption lighting technology is in high demand. In this review, we will summarise and discuss one of the emerging lighting technologies – white electroluminescence light-emitting diodes enabled by hybrid colloidal quantum dots (WQLEDs), which have attracted intense attention because of promising potential in both flat-panel backlighting and solid-state lighting. WQLEDs have unique high luminescence efficiency, broad colour tunability and solution processability. Over the past few decades, the development of colloidal quantum dot synthesis, material engineering and device architecture has highlighted the tremendous improvements in WQLED formation. As WQLED efficiencies approach those of molecular organic LEDs, we identify the critical scientific and technological challenges and provide an outlook for ongoing strategies to overcome these challenges