AMOLED

(Active-Matrix Organic Light

Emitting Diode)

Submitte
d By,
Pratham Kumar
 (070
2931075)
EC(4th
year)
Introduction
What is AMOLED?
Active-matrix OLED (Active-matrix
organic light-emitting
diode or AMOLED) is a display
technology for use in mobile devices
and televisions. OLED describes a
specific type of thin display
technology which doesn't require
a backlight, and Active-Matrix refers
to the technology behind the
addressing of pixels.
AMOLED technology continues to
make progress towards low-power and
low-cost large size (e.g. 40-inch) for
applications such as TV.
What is OLED?
An organic light emitting
diode (OLED) is a light-emitting
diode (LED) in which
the emissive electroluminescent layer
is a film of organic compounds that
emits light when an electric current
passes through it. This layer
of organic semiconductor material is
formed between two electrodes.
Generally, at least one of these
electrodes is transparent.
OLEDs are used
in television screens, computer
monitors, small, portable system
screens such as mobile
phones and PDAs, watches,
advertising, information and
indication; they can also be used in
light sources for general space
illumination and in large-area light-
emitting elements.
OLED displays can use
either passive-matrix or active-matrix
addressing schemes.
Difference between AMOLED &
PMOLED
There are two types of OLEDs
used in displays - PMOLED and
AMOLED. The difference is in the
driving electronics - it can be either
Passive Matrix (PM) or Active Matrix
(AM).
With Passive-Matrix OLEDs, the
display is controlled by switching on
rows and columns. When you turn on
row number x and column number y,
the pixel at the intersection is lit - and
emits light. Each time you can choose
just one pixel to light. So you have to
turn these on and off very quickly. You
do so in a certain sequence, and
create the desired image.
PMOLEDs are very easy and cheap to
build, but they are limited to small
sizes. The image displaying is a bit
complicated. Also the power
consumption is not as good as
AMOLEDs.
AMOLEDs have a different driver
electronics - each pixel is controlled
directly. AMOLEDs are more
expensive, and much more difficult to
create, but can be used for larger
displays (current prototypes are up to
40") and are very power efficient.
The first OLED products in the
market used PMOLEDs - these were
MP3 players, sub-displays on
cellphones and radio decks for
automobiles. The displays were small
and usually with just one or two
colors. When AMOLED panels started
to emerge in 2007 and 2008 we have
seen these larger displays in mobile
video players, digital cameras, mobile
phones main displays and even OLED
TVs.
 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.
An OLED consists of the following
parts:
• Substrate (clear plastic, glass,
foil) - The substrate supports
the OLED.
• Anode (transparent) - The
anode removes electrons
 when a current flows through
the device.
• Organic layers - These layers
are made of organic
molecules or polymers.
• 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.
How OLED works?
OLEDs emit light in a similar
manner to LEDs, through a process
called electro-phosphorescence.
The process is as follows:
The battery or power supply
1.

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 .
4.The OLED emits light.
5.The color of the light depends
on the type of organic
molecule in the emissive
layer. Manufacturers place
several types of organic films
on the same OLED to make
color displays.
6.The intensity or brightness of
the light depends on the
amount of electrical current
applied: the more current, the
brighter the light.
 Working Principle
A typical OLED is composed of a
layer of organic materials situated
between two electrodes,
the anode and cathode, all deposited
on a substrate. The organic molecules
are electrically conductive as a result
of delocalization of pi
electrons caused by conjugation over
all or part of the molecule. These
materials have conductivity levels
ranging from insulators to conductors,
and therefore are considered organic
semiconductors. The highest occupied
and lowest unoccupied molecular
orbital (HOMO and LUMO) of organic
semiconductors are analogous to
the valence and conduction bands of
inorganic semiconductors.
During operation, a voltage is applied
across the OLED such that the anode
is positive with respect to the cathode.
A current of electrons flows through
the device from cathode to anode, as
electrons are injected into the LUMO
of the organic layer at the cathode
and withdrawn from the HOMO at the
anode. This latter process may also be
described as the injection of electron
holes into the HOMO. Electrostatic
forces bring the electrons and the
holes towards each other and they
recombine forming an exciton, a
bound state of the electron and hole.
This happens closer to the emissive
layer, because in organic
semiconductors holes are generally
more mobile than electrons. The
decay of this excited state results in a
relaxation of the energy levels of the
electron, accompanied by emission
of radiation whose frequency is in
the visible region. The frequency of
this radiation depends on the band
gap of the material, in this case the
difference in energy between the
HOMO and LUMO.
As electrons and holes
are fermions with half integer spin, an
exciton may either be in a singlet
state or a triplet state depending on
how the spins of the electron and hole
have been combined. Statistically
three triplet excitons will be formed
for each singlet exciton. Decay from triplet
states (phosphorescence) is spin
forbidden, increasing the timescale of
the transition and limiting the internal
efficiency of fluorescent
devices. Phosphorescent organic light-
emitting diodes make use of spin–orbit
interactions to facilitate intersystem
crossing between singlet and triplet
states, thus obtaining emission from
both singlet and triplet states and
improving the internal efficiency.
 Material technologies
 Molecules commonly used in
OLEDs include
organometallic Chelates,
fluorescent and phosphorescent
dyes and conjugated dendrimers.
 Triphenylamine and derivatives are

commonly used as materials for

hole transport layers.
 The production of small molecule
devices and displays usually
involves
thermal evaporation in a vacuum.
 Working of PMOLED
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.
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 are best suited
for small screens (2- to 3-inch
diagonal) such as those you find
in cell phones, PDAs and MP3 players.
 Working of AMOLED
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.
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.
 Advantages
The different manufacturing
process of AMOLEDs lends itself to
several advantages over flat-panel
displays made with LCD technology.
+Low power
+Low cost
+Thin, lightweight and rugged
+Superior image quality
+Wide-viewing angle
+ Rollable Display
 Problems
Lifespan: The biggest technical
problem for OLEDs was the limited
lifetime of the organic materials.
Water damage: Water can damage
the organic materials of the displays.
Screen burn-in: Unlike displays with
a common light source, the brightness
of each OLED pixel fades depending
on the content displayed. The varied
lifespan of the organic dyes can cause
a discrepancy between red, green,
and blue intensity. This leads to image
persistence, also known as burn-in.
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.
Manufacturing Cost: Quite high.
References
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active-
matrix_OLED
• www.google.com
• http://www.oled-info.com/oled-

technology
• http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/ole

d1.htm
• http://www.oled-display.net/what-is-

amoled
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organic_LE

D
• http://www.gadgets-

reviews.com/store/index.html