Amoled Display

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

AMOLED (active-matrix organic light-emitting diode) is a display technology for use in mobile devices and televisions. OLED describes a specific type of thin-film display technology in which organic compounds form the electroluminescent material, and active matrix refers to the technology behind the addressing of pixels. As of 2012, AMOLED technology is used in mobile phones, media players and digital cameras and continues to make progress toward low-power, low-cost and large-size (for example, 40-inch) applications An AMOLED display consists of an active matrix of OLED pixels that generate light upon electrical activation that have been deposited or integrated onto a thin film transistor (TFT) array, which functions as a series of switches to control the current flowing to each individual pixel. Typically, this continuous current flow is controlled by at least two TFTs at each pixel, one to start and stop the charging of a storage capacitor and the second to provide a voltage source at the level needed to create a constant current to the pixel and eliminating the need for the very high currents required for passive matrix OLED operation. TFT backplane technology is crucial in the fabrication of AMOLED displays. Two primary TFT backplane technologies, namely polycrystalline silicon (poly-Si) and amorphous silicon (a-Si), are used today in AMOLEDs. These technologies offer the potential for fabricating the active matrix backplanes at low temperatures (below 150C) directly onto flexible plastic substrates for producing flexible AMOLED displays Currently, OLEDs are used in small-screen devices such as cell phones, PDAs and digital cameras. In September 2004, Sony Corporation announced that it was beginning mass production of OLED screens for its CLIE PEG-VZ90 model of personal-entertainment handhelds.

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Fig. 1.1. OLED display for Sony Clie

Kodak was the first to release a digital camera with an OLED display in March 2003, the EasyShare LS633

Fig.1.2.Kodak LS633 EasyShare with OLED display

In May 2005, Samsung Electronics announced that it had developed a prototype40inch, OLEDbased, ultra-slim TV, the first of its size. And in October 2007, Sony announced that it would be the first to market with an OLED television. The XEL-1 was available in December 2007 for customers in Japan.

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Fig.1.3. The Sony 11-inch XEL-1 OLED TV.

As of 2012, AMOLED technology is used in mobile phones, media players and digital cameras, and continues to make progress toward low-power, low-cost and large-size (for example, 40-inch) applications

Research and development in the field of OLEDs is proceeding rapidly and may lead to future applications in heads-up displays, automotive dashboards, billboard-type displays, home and office lighting and flexible displays. Because OLEDs refresh faster than LCDs almost 1,000 times faster - a device with an OLED display could change information almost in real time. Video

Images could be much more realistic and constantly updated. The newspaper of the future might be an OLED display that refreshes with breaking news and like a regular newspaper, you could fold it up when you're done reading it and stick it in your backpack or briefcase.

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CHAPTER 2 OLED 2.1. OLED COMPONENTS

Like an LED, an OLED is a solid-state semiconductor device that is 100 to 500 nanometers thick or about 200 times smaller than a human hair. OLEDs can have either two layers or three layers of organic material; in the latter design, the third layer helps transport electrons from the cathode to the emissive layer. In this article, we'll be focusing on the two-layer design.

Fig.2.1. OLED structure

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An OLED consists of the following parts: Substrate (clear plastic, glass, foil) - The substrate supports the OLED.

Anode (transparent) - The anode removes electrons (adds electron "holes") when a current flows through the device.

Organic layers - These layers are made of organic molecules or polymers. Molecules commonly used in OLEDs include organometallic chelates.

Conducting layer - This layer is made of organic plastic molecules that transport "holes" from the anode. One conducting polymer used in OLEDs is polyaniline. Emissive layer - This layer is made of organic plastic molecules (different ones from the conducting layer) that transport electrons from the cathode; this is where light is made. One polymer used in the emissive layer is polyfluorene.

Cathode (may or may not be transparent depending on the type of OLED) - The cathode injects electrons when a current flows through the device.

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2.2. OLED WORKING

OLEDs emit light in a similar manner to LEDs, through a process called electrophosphorescence.

Fig.2.2. Working of Oled

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The process is as follows: 1. The battery or power supply of the device containing the OLED applies a voltage across the OLED.

2. An electrical current flows from the cathode to the anode through the organic layers (an electrical current is a flow of electrons). The cathode gives electrons to the emissive layer of organic molecules. The anode removes electrons from the conductive layer of organic molecules. (This is the equivalent to giving electron holes to the conductive layer.) 3. At the boundary between the emissive and the conductive layers, electrons find electron holes. When an electron finds an electron hole, the electron fills the hole (it falls into an energy level of the atom that's missing an electron). When this happens, the electron gives up energy in the form of a photon of light.

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2.3. TYPES OF OLEDS

There are mainly two types of OLEDs , they are

2.3.1. PASSIVE MATRIX 2.3.2 ACTIVE MATRIX 2.3.1 PASSIVE MATRIX OLED
PMOLEDs have strips of cathode, organic layers and strips of anode. The anode strips are arranged perpendicular to the cathode strips. The intersections of the cathode and anode make up the pixels where light is emitted. External circuitry applies current to selected strips of anode and cathode, determining which pixels get turned on and which pixels remain off. Again, the brightness of each pixel is proportional to the amount of applied current.

Fig.2.3. Structure of PMOLED

PMOLEDs are easy to make, but they consume more power than other types of OLED, mainly due to the power needed for the external circuitry. PMOLEDs are most efficient for text and icons and

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are best suited for small screens (2- to 3-inch diagonal) such as those you find in cell phones, PDAs and MP3 players. Even with the external circuitry, passive-matrix OLEDs consume less battery power than the LCDs that currently power these devices. So while PMOLEDs are easy (and cheap) to fabricate, they are not efficient and the OLED materials suffer from lower lifetime (due to the high voltage needed). PMOLED displays are also restricted in resolution and size (the more lines you have, the more voltage you have to use).

Fig.2.4. MP3 player

PMOLED displays are usually small (up to 3" typically) and are used to display character data or small icons: they are being used in MP3 players, mobile phone sub displays, etc.

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CHAPTER 3 ACTIVE MATRIX OLED

AMOLEDs have full layers of cathode, organic molecules and anode, but the anode layer overlays a thin film transistor (TFT) array that forms a matrix. The TFT array itself is the circuitry that determines which pixels get turned on to form an image.

Fig.3.1. Structure of AMOLED

AMOLEDs consume less power than PMOLEDs because the TFT array requires less power than external circuitry, so they are efficient for large displays. AMOLEDs also have faster refresh rates suitable for video. The best uses for AMOLEDs are computer monitors, large-screen TVs and electronic signs or billboards.

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Fig.3.2.Active Matrix Addressing

Fig.3.3. AMOLED crossection

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CHAPTER 4 AMOLED MANUFACTURING PROCESS

The biggest part of manufacturing AMOLEDs is applying the organic layers to the substrate. This can be done in three ways: Vacuum deposition or vacuum thermal evaporation (VTE) - In a vacuum chamber, the organic molecules are gently heated (evaporated) and allowed to condense as thin films onto cooled substrates. This process is expensive and inefficient.

Organic vapor phase deposition (OVPD) - In a low-pressure, hot-walled reactor chamber, a carrier gas transports evaporated organic molecules onto cooled substrates, where they condense into thin films. Using a carrier gas increases the efficiency and reduces the cost of making OLEDs.

Inkjet printing - With inkjet technology, OLEDs are sprayed onto substrates just like inks are sprayed onto paper during printing. Inkjet technology greatly reduces the cost of OLED manufacturing and allows OLEDs to be printed onto very large films for large displays like 80-inch TV screens or electronic billboards.

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4.1 COMPARISON TO OTHER TECHNOLOGIES

AMOLED displays provide higher refresh rates than their passive-matrix OLED counterparts, improving response time often to under a millisecond, and they consume significantly less power. This advantage makes active-matrix OLEDs well suited for portable electronics, where power consumption is critical to battery life. The amount of power the display consumes varies significantly depending on the color and brightness shown. As an example, one commercial QVGA OLED display consumes 3 watts while showing black text on a white background, but only 0.7 watts showing white text on a black background. Because the black pixels actually turn off, AMOLED also has contrast ratios that are significantly better than LCD. AMOLED mobile phone users can save battery power by avoiding white backgrounds and many methods exist to achieve this, such as using Black Google Mobile to search with a black background. The Windows Phone 7 platform takes advantage of this characteristic, as it instructs the user to maintain the "white text on black background" theme to have a better battery autonomy. AMOLED displays may be difficult to view in direct sunlight compared to LCDs because of their reduced maximum brightness. Samsung's Super AMOLED technology addresses this issue by reducing the size of gaps between layers of the screen. Additionally, PenTile technology is sometimes used, rearranging the subpixels for each color and in the case of PenTile RGBW, adding a white subpixel, which emits more light due to a lack of a R/G/B filter, thereby increasing brightness, albeit while introducing graininess.

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4.2 COMPARISON OF SCREEN TECHNOLOGIES

There are a number of contenders for screen technology within the television, computer monitor and other related areas. Although cathode ray tubes are now well out of the picture, developers of equipment have a choice of technologies of which the AMOLED is one.

AMOLED Potentially the lowest cost. Consumes lowest power

LCD Medium cost. Lower Power consumption than plasma

PLASMA Highest cost Highest power consumption

Self emissive. Displays wider colour range.

Requires backlight. Colour range not good.

Requires backlight. Displays a very deep black. Screen burn potential Half life ~60k hours

No screen burn potential Shorter overall lifetime

No screen burn potential Backlight bulb typically requires replace at around 30 k hours

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CHAPTER 5 APPLICATIONS OF AMOLED

The AMOLED has a number of advantages over its passive relation. This means that AMOLED displays can be used in many more areas. AMOLED display are manufactured by the companies like Samsung Mobile Display, LG display, Kodak etc for Smartphones, TV, Digital Cameras, Mp3 Players and Tablets. Currently the AMOLED is used in the Android smartphones like Samsung Galaxy S II, Nexus S, HTC, Nokia. Since then AMOLED displays have been used in a number of televisions. Currently sizes are not as large as those available with LCD or Plasma displays, but in view of the anticipated cost advantages that are likely to be gained from the use of AMOLED displays, much investment is being directed towards the development of AMOLEDs.

As such the major application for AMOLEDs is likely to be within televisions and computers, although the life of the display is currently an issue.

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CHAPTER 6 ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES

6.1. ADVANTAGES
The different manufacturing process of OLEDs lends itself to several advantages over flat panel displays made with LCD technology. Lower cost: OLEDs can be printed onto any suitable substrate by an inkjet printer or even by screen printing, theoretically making them cheaper to produce than LCD or plasma displays. However, fabrication of the OLED substrate is more costly than that of a TFT LCD, until mass production methods lower cost through scalability. Roll-roll vapor-deposition methods for organic devices do allow mass production of thousands of devices per minute for minimal cost, although this technique also induces problems in that multi-layer devices can be challenging to make due to registration issues, lining up the different printed layers to the required degree of accuracy. They resist instant pressure, brakeless when fall from certain height. It uses plastic layer instead of Glass layers.

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High

contrast

ratio:

Higher

contrast

ratio

gives

impression

for

higher

brightness.AMOLED is much transmissive than TFT for sunlight readability.

AM

Fig.6.1. High Contrast Ratio

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Wider viewing angles & improved brightness :OLEDs can enable a greater artificial contrast ratio (both dynamic range and static, measured in purely dark conditions) and viewing angle compared to LCDs because OLED pixels directly emit light. OLED pixel colours appear correct and unshifted, even as the viewing angle approaches 90 from normal.

AM AM

Fig.6.2. Wide Viewing Angle of Amoled

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Fast Response Time: AMOLEDs can also have a faster response time than standard LCD screens. Whereas LCD displays are capable of between 2 and 16 ms response time offering a refresh rate of 60 to 480 Hz, an AMOLED can theoretically have less than 0.01 ms response time, enabling up to 100,000 Hz refresh rate.

AM

Fig.6.3 Fast Response of Ampled

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Better power efficiency: LCDs filter the light emitted from a backlight, allowing a small fraction of light through so they cannot show true black, while an inactive OLED element does not produce light or consume power.

Fig.6.4.Power efficiency Comparison

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Light weight & flexible: plastic substrates: OLED displays can be fabricated on flexible plastic substrates leading to the possibility of flexible organic light-emitting diodes being fabricated or other new applications such as roll-up displays embedded in fabrics or clothing. As the substrate used can be flexible such as PET, the displays may be produced inexpensively.

Fig.6.5 Amoled Flexible

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Ultra Thin: It is very slim compared to other display technology.

Fig.6.6. Amoled Slimness

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6.2. DISADVANTAGES

Current costs: OLED manufacture currently requires process steps that make it extremely expensive. Specifically, it requires the use of Low-Temperature Polysilicon backplanes; LTPS backplanes in turn require laser annealing from an amorphous silicon start, so this part of the manufacturing process for AMOLEDs starts with the process costs of standard LCD, and then adds an expensive, time-consuming process that cannot currently be used on largearea glass substrates. Lifespan: The biggest technical problem for OLEDs was the limited lifetime of the organic materials. In particular, blue OLEDs historically have had a lifetime of around 14,000 hours to half original brightness (five years at 8 hours a day) when used for flat-panel displays. This is lower than the typical lifetime of LCD, LED or PDP technology each currently rated for about 25,000-40,000 hours to half brightness, depending on manufacturer and model. However, some manufacturers' displays aim to increase the lifespan of OLED displays, pushing their expected life past that of LCD displays by improving light out coupling, thus achieving the same brightness at a lower drive current. In 2007, experimental OLEDs were created which can sustain 400 cd/m2 of luminance for over 198,000 hours for green OLEDs and 62,000 hours for blue OLEDs. Color balance issues: Additionally, as the OLED material used to produce blue light degrades significantly more rapidly than the materials that produce other colors; blue light output will decrease relative to the other colors of light. This variation in the differential color output will change the color balance of the display and is much more noticeable than a decrease in overall luminance. This can be partially avoided by adjusting color balance but this may require advanced control circuits and interaction with the user, which is unacceptable for some users. In order to delay the problem, manufacturers bias the color balance towards blue so that the display initially has an artificially blue tint, leading to complaints of artificial-looking, over-saturated colors. More commonly, though, manufacturers optimize the size of the R, G and B subpixels to reduce the current density

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through the subpixel in order to equalize lifetime at full luminance. For example, a blue subpixel may be 100% larger than the green subpixel. The red subpixel may be 10% smaller than the green. Efficiency of blue OLEDs: Improvements to the efficiency and lifetime of blue OLEDs is vital to the success of OLEDs as replacements for LCD technology. Considerable research has been invested in developing blue OLEDs with high external quantum efficiency as well as a deeper blue color. External quantum efficiency values of 20% and 19% have been reported for red (625 nm) and green (530 nm) diodes, respectively. However, blue diodes (430 nm) have only been able to achieve maximum external quantum efficiencies in the range of 4% to 6%. Water damage: Water can damage the organic materials of the displays. Therefore, improved sealing processes are important for practical manufacturing.Water damage may especially limit the longevity of more flexible displays. Outdoor performance: As an emissive display technology, OLEDs rely completely upon converting electricity to light, unlike most LCDs which are to some extent reflective; e-ink leads the way in efficiency with ~ 33% ambient light reflectivity, enabling the display to be used without any internal light source. The metallic cathode in OLED acts as a mirror, with reflectance approaching 80%, leading to poor readability in bright ambient light such as outdoors. However, with the proper application of a circular polarizer and anti-reflective coatings, the diffuse reflectance can be reduced to less than 0.1%. With 10,000 fc incident illumination (typical test condition for simulating outdoor illumination), that yields an approximate photopic contrast of 5:1. Power consumption: While an OLED will consume around 40% of the power of an LCD displaying an image which is primarily black, for the majority of images it will consume 6080% of the power of an LCD: however it can use over three times as much power to display an image with a white background such as a document or website. This can lead to reduced

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real-world battery life in mobile devices when white backgrounds are used.This disadvantage has led to alternative mobile platform solutions, such as Black Google Mobile, that provide black background alternatives when otherwise unavailable. UV sensitivity: OLED displays can be damaged by prolonged exposure to UV light. The most pronounced example of this can be seen with a near UV laser (such as a Bluray pointer) and can damage the display almost instantly with more than 20 mW leading to dim or dead spots where the beam is focused. This is usually avoided by installing a UV blocking filter over the panel and this can easily be seen as a clear plastic layer on the glass. Removal of this filter can lead to severe damage and an unusable display after only a few months of room light exposure.

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CHAPTER 7 FUTURE PERSPECTIVE

Super AMOLED
Super AMOLED is Samsung's term for an AMOLED display with an integrated digitizer, meaning, the layer that detects touch is integrated into the screen, rather than being overlaid on top of it. According to Samsung, Super AMOLED reflects 5 times less sunlight compared to the first generation AMOLED. The display technology itself is not changed.

Super AMOLED Advanced

Super AMOLED Advanced is a term marketed by Motorola to describe a brighter display than Super AMOLED screens, but also a higher resolution qHD or 960 540 for Super AMOLED Advanced compared to WVGA or 800 480 for Super AMOLED. This display equips the Motorola Droid RAZR

Super AMOLED Plus

Super AMOLED Plus, first introduced with the Samsung Galaxy S II and Samsung Droid Charge smartphones, is a branding from Samsung where the PenTile RGBG pixel matrix (2 subpixels) used in Super AMOLED displays has been replaced with a traditional RGB RGB (3 subpixels) arrangement typically used in LCD displays. This variant of AMOLED is brighter and therefore more energy efficient than Super AMOLED displays and produces a sharper, less grainy image because of the increased number of subpixels. In comparison to AMOLED and Super AMOLED displays, the Super AMOLED Plus displays are even more energy efficient and brighter.

HD Super AMOLED
HD Super AMOLED is a branding from Samsung for an HD-resolution (>1280720) Super AMOLED display. The first device to use it was the Samsung Galaxy Note. The Galaxy Nexus and the Galaxy S III both implement the HD Super AMOLED with a PenTile RGBG-

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matrix (2 subpixels/pixel) , while the Galaxy Note II uses an RBG matrix (3 subpixels/pixel) but not in the standard 3 stripe arrangement.

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CHAPTER 8 CONCLUSION

Performance of AMOLEDs depend upon many parameters such as electron and hole mobility, magnitude of applied field, nature of hole and electron transport layers and excited lifetimes. Organic materials are poised as never before to transform the world IF circuit and display technology. Major electronics firms are betting that the future holds tremendous opportunity for the low cost and sometimes surprisingly high performance offered by organic electronic and optoelectronic devices. Organic Light Emitting Diodes are evolving as the next generation of light sources. Researches are going on, on this subject and it is sure that OLED will emerge as future solid state light source.

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REFERENCES

[1]Lee, Hyunkoo; Park, Insun; Kwak, Jeonghun; Yoon, Do Y.; Kallmann, Changhee Lee (2010). "Improvement of electron injection in inverted bottom-emission blue phosphorescent organic light emitting diodes using zinc oxide nanoparticles".Applied Physics Letters 96: 153306. [2] Kim, Yang Wan; Kwak, Won Kyu; Lee, Jae Yong; Choi, Wong Sik; Lee, Ki Yong; Kim, Sung Chul; Yoo, Eui Jin (2009). "40 Inch FHD AM-OLED Display with IR Drop Compensation Pixel Circuit". SID Symposium Digest of Technical Papers 40: 85. [3] Lin, Chih-Lung; Chen, Yung-Chih. "A Novel LTPS-TFT Pixel Circuit Compensating for TFT Threshold-Voltage Shift and OLED Degradation for AMOLED". IEEE Electron Device Letters28: 129. [4] Suyko, Alan. "Oleds Ready For The Mainstream." Electronics News (2009): 20. Associates Programs Source Plus. Web. 9 Dec. 2011. [5] Mian Dong; Choi, Y.-S.K; Lin Zhong (July 2009). "Power modeling of graphical user interfaces on OLED displays".Design Automation Conference, 2009. DAC '09. 46th ACM/IEEE(IEEE): 652657.

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