New bipolar host materials for realizing blue phosphorescent organic light-emitting diodes with high efficiency at 1000 cd/m2

Probing Electron Excitation Characters of Carboline-Based Bis-Tridentate Ir(III) Complexes

In this work, we report a series of bis-tridentate Ir(III) metal complexes, comprising a dianionic pyrazole-pyridine-phenyl tridentate chelate and a monoanionic chelate bearing a peripheral carbene and carboline coordination fragment that is linked to the central phenyl group. All these Ir(III) complexes were synthesized with an efficient one-pot and two-step method, and their emission hue was fine-tuned by variation of the substituent at the central coordination entity (i.e., pyridinyl and phenyl group) of each of the tridentate chelates. Their photophysical and electrochemical properties, thermal stabilities and electroluminescence performances are examined and discussed comprehensively. The doped devices based on [Ir(cbF)(phyz1)] (Cb1) and [Ir(cbB)(phyz1)] (Cb4) give a maximum external quantum efficiency (current efficiency) of 16.6% (55.2 cd/A) and 13.9% (43.8 cd/A), respectively. The relatively high electroluminescence efficiencies indicate that bis-tridentate Ir(III) complexes are promising candidates for OLED applications.

Efficient blue electroluminescence with an external quantum efficiency of 9.20% and CIE y < 0.08 without excimer emission

Aromatically substituted phenanthroimidazoles at the C6 and C9 positions enhanced the thermal, photochemical and electroluminescence properties due to extension of conjugation. These new materials exhibit good photophysical properties with high thermal stability, good film-forming property and high luminous efficiency. The electroluminescence performances of C6 and C9 modified phenanthroimidazoles as host emitters were evaluated as well as the dopant in the fabricated devices. Among the non-doped devices, pyrene substituted PPI-Py or PPICN-Py based devices show maximum efficiency: PPI-Py/PPICN-Py: η c (cd A-1) - 9.20/9.98; η p (lm W-1) - 8.50/9.16; η ex (%) - 5.56/5.80. The doped OLEDs, m-MTDATA/TAPC:PPI-Cz (4.81/4.85%), m-MTDATA/TAPC:PPICN-Cz (5.23/5.26%), m-MTDATA/TAPC:PPI-An (5.01/5.04%), m-MTDATA/TAPC:PPICN-An (5.25/5.28%), m-MTDATA/TAPC:PPI-Py (5.61/5.65%) and m-MTDATA/TAPC:PPICN-Py (5.76/5.78%) show improved device efficiencies compared to non-doped devices. Designing C6/C9 modified phenanthrimidazole fluorophores is an efficient strategy for constructing highly efficient OLEDs.

Rational Design of Carbazole- and Carboline-Based Polymeric Host Materials for Realizing High-Efficiency Solution-Processed Thermally Activated Delayed Fluorescence Organic Light-Emitting Diode

Recently, various host materials have been developed for solution-processed thermally activated delayed fluorescent organic light-emitting diodes (TADF-OLEDs). Compared with small-molecule hosts, polymeric hosts are advantageous for inducing a uniform distribution and segregation of dopant molecules in the emissive layer without undesired large-scale phase separation. In this study, new polymer hosts were demonstrated, in which a bipolar conjugative moiety consisting of a carbazole (Cz) donor and an α-carboline (α-Cb) acceptor was bound to the polystyrene backbone through a non-conjugated linker. They exhibited high triplet energies of >2.8 eV, and their emission spectra overlapped with the absorption spectrum of a green TADF emitter, which allowed facile energy transfer from the polymeric host to the small-molecule dopants. High device performance was observed, with external quantum efficiencies (EQEs) of 13.65, 17.09, and 17.48% for solution-processed green TADF-OLEDs using PSCzCz, PSCzCb, and PSCbCz, respectively, as hosts for the EML. The EQEs of bipolar host (PSCzCb and PSCbCz)-based devices were higher than those of unipolar host (poly(N-vinylcarbazole) and PSCzCz)-based devices owing to the well-balanced charge-carrier transport. According to these results, the polymeric host bearing a bipolar Cz and α-Cb coupled moiety is a promising material for solution-processable TADF-OLEDs.

High-Efficiency Blue Phosphorescent Organic Light-Emitting Devices with Low Efficiency Roll-Off at Ultrahigh Luminance by the Reduction of Triplet-Polaron Quenching

High-performance phosphorescent organic light-emitting devices (PhOLEDs) at high luminance are still a remaining problem that needs to be solved, especially blue PhOLEDs. Here, 5-(5-9 H-carbazol-9-yl)pyridin-2-yl)-8-(9 H-carbazol-9-yl)-5 H-pyrido[3,2- b]indole (p2PCB2CZ) with excellent characteristics as a host is designed to realize a novel host-guest system without hole trapping effect in blue PhOLEDs. The device in which p2PCB2CZ and bis(3,5-difluoro-2-(2-pyridyl)phenyl-(2-carboxypyridyl)iridium(III) (FIrpic) is used as host and guest, respectively, is proposed to improve the performances of blue PhOLEDs at high luminance, especially at ultrahigh luminance (>30000 cd/m²). The maximum external quantum efficiency (EQE) of this type of blue PhOLEDs is 19.2%, while the maximum EQE of the reference blue PhOLEDs is 18.7%. Nevertheless, the p2PCB2CZ-based devices exhibit significant advantages at high luminance, because its EQE still attains to 10.8% even when the luminance increases to 30000 cd/m², which is 1.67 times that of the reference device. From measurements based on steady-state and time-resolved spectroscopies, the reduction of triplet-polaron quenching in p2PCB2CZ-based devices is proved to be the main reason for improving the performances of blue PhOLEDs at high luminance.

Manipulation of Thermally Activated Delayed Fluorescence of Blue Exciplex Emission: Fully Utilizing Exciton Energy for Highly Efficient Organic Light Emitting Diodes with Low Roll-Off

The application of exciplex energy has become a unique way to achieve organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) with high efficiencies, low turn-on voltage, and low roll-off. Novel δ-carboline derivatives with high triplet energy (T₁ ≈ 2.92 eV) and high glass transition temperature (T_g ≈ 153 °C) were employed to manipulate exciplex emissions in this paper. Deep blue (peak at 436 nm) and pure blue (peak at 468 nm) thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) of exciplex OLEDs were demonstrated by utilizing them as emitters with the maximum current efficiency (CE) of 4.64 cd A^-1, power efficiency (PE) of 2.91 lm W^-1, and external quantum efficiency (EQE) of 2.36%. Highly efficient blue phosphorescent OLEDs doped with FIrpic showed a maximum CE of 55.6 cd A^-1, PE of 52.9 lm W^-1, and EQE of 24.6% respectively with very low turn on voltage at 2.7 V. The devices still remain high CE of 46.5 cd A^-1 at 100 cd m^-2, 45.4 cd A^-1 at 1000 cd m^-2 and 42.3 cd A^-1 at 5000 cd m^-2 with EQE close to 20% indicating low roll-off. Manipulating blue exciplex emissions by chemical structure gives an ideal strategy to fully utilize all exciton energies for lighting of OLEDs.

Adjusting Nitrogen Atom Orientations of Pyridine Ring in Tetraphenylsilane-Based Hosts for Highly Efficient Blue Phosphorescent Organic Light-Emitting Devices

Four wide bandgap host materials, namely, 9-(4-diphenyl(4-(pyridin-3-yl)phenyl)silyl-phenyl)-9H-carbazole (CSmP), 9-(4-diphenyl(4-(pyridin-2-yl)phenyl)silylphenyl)-9H-carbazole (CSoP), 9-(4-diphenyl(4-(pyridin-3-yl)phenyl)silylphenyl)-9H-3,9'-bicarbazole (DCSmP), and 9-(4-(diphenyl(4-(pyridin-2-yl)phenyl)silyl)phenyl)-9H-3,9'-bicarbazole (DCSoP), have developed by incorporation of pyridine with varied N atom orientation and carbazole/dimer carbazole units into the tetraphenylsilane skeleton for blue phosphorescent light-emitting diodes. These host materials all possess wide bandgap (3.54-3.64 eV) and high triplet energies (2.77-2.95 eV). As revealed by the absorption and emission spectra, theoretical calculations, and CV measurements, the N atom orientation exerts a strong influence on the LUMO energy level and electron-transportation behaviors without deterioring the photophysical properties. Among them, DCSmP with 3-pyridyl substituent manifests the best electron-transporting capability. The FIrpic-doped blue phosphorescent device using DCSmP as host material exhibits excellent electroluminescence performance with a maximum current efficiency of 40.1 cd A(-1) and a maximum external quantum efficiency of 20.0%. The current efficiency and external quantum efficiency are improved 3-fold, higher than those fabricated from DCSpP with 4-pyridyl as substituent, demonstrating an effective strategy for large improvement in device performance by a subtle change in molecular structure.

High-Performance Blue OLEDs Based on Phenanthroimidazole Emitters via Substitutions at the C6- and C9-Positions for Improving Exciton Utilization

Donor-acceptor (D-A) molecular architecture has been shown to be an effective strategy for obtaining high-performance electroluminescent materials. In this work, two D-A molecules, Ph-BPA-BPI and Py-BPA-BPI, have been synthesized by attaching highly fluorescent phenanthrene or pyrene groups to the C6- and C9-positions of a locally excited-state emitting phenylamine-phenanthroimidazole moiety. Equipped with good physical and hybridized local and charge-transfer properties, both molecules show high performances as blue emitters in nondoped organic light-emitting devices (OLEDs). An OLED using Ph-BPA-BPI as the emitting layer exhibits deep-blue emission with CIE coordinates of (0.15, 0.08), and a maximum external quantum efficiency (EQE), current efficiency (CE), and power efficiency (PE) of 4.56 %, 3.60 cd A(-1) , and 3.66 lm W(-1) , respectively. On the other hand, a Py-BPA-BPI-based, sky-blue OLED delivers the best results among nondoped OLEDs with CIEy values of < 0.3 reported so far, for which a very low turn-on voltage of 2.15 V, CIE coordinates of (0.17, 0.29), and maximum CE, PE, and EQE values of 10.9 cd A(-1) , 10.5 lm W(-1) , and 5.64 %, were achieved, respectively. More importantly, both devices show little or even no efficiency roll-off and high singlet exciton-utilizing efficiencies of 36.2 % for Ph-BPA-BPI and 39.2 % for Py-BPA-BPI.

Synthesis, Luminescent Properties of aza-Boron-Diquinomethene Difluoride Complexes and Their Application for Fluorescent Security Inks

Two aza-boron-diquinomethene (aza-BODIQU) complexes bearing phenyl and carbazyl substituents were synthesized and characterized. Their photophysical properties were investigated systematically via spectroscopic and theoretical methods. Both complexes exhibit strong (1)π-π* transition absorptions (λ(abs) = 400-540 nm) and intense fluorescent emissions (λ(em) = 440-600 nm, Φ(PL) = 0.93 and 0.78) in CH2Cl2 solution and in solid state at room temperature. Compared to the complex with phenyl groups, the complex bearing carbazyl groups shows significant bathochromic shift in both absorption and emission. This could be attributed to the larger π-electron conjugation of the carbazole unit and intramolecular charge transfer feature from carbazole to aza-BODIQU component. In addition, the complexes exhibit intense photoluminescence and good stability on antacid, anti-alkali and stability in printing ink samples, which makes them potential dopants for the application of fluorescent security inks.

Highly efficient yellow phosphorescent OLEDs based on two novel bipolar host materials

Yellow OLEDs based on bipolar host materials show a maximum current efficiency of 44.4 cd A⁻¹ with low efficiency roll-off.

Synthesis, physical and electroluminescence properties of 3,6-dipyrenylcarbazole end capped oligofluorenes

A series of oligofluorenes bearing 3,6-dipyrenylcarbazoles as the terminal substituents showed strong blue emission with good solubility, and thermally stable amorphous and excellent film-forming properties. OLEDs using these materials exhibited excellent device performance.