Organic Optoelectronic Devices:

Organic Light-Emitting Diodes

(OLED)

Minlu Zhang
Outline

– Small molecular OLEDs (OLED)

– Polymer OLEDs (PLED)
– Applications
– Challenges
Small molecular OLEDs — Structure

Single layer device

Cathode
P-n junction device
Organic Layer Multiple layers device
Anode Cathode
Cathode
Substrate Electron transport layer
Electron Injection layer
Hole transport layer
Electron transport layer
Anode
Emissive layer
Substrate
Hole transport layer
Hole Injection layer
Anode
Substrate
Small molecular OLEDs — Device operation principle
Cathode
Electron Injection layer
Electron transport layer
 Electrons injected from cathode
Emissive layer
 Holes injected from anode
Hole transport layer
Hole Injection layer  Transport and radiative recombination of
Anode
electron hole pairs at emissive layer
Substrate

LUMO — Ec
Light e- e-
e-
Transparent
substrate ITO HIL HTL EML ETL EIL Cathode
h+
h+ h+
HOMO — Ev
Small molecular OLEDs — Materials

EIL, ETL: n-type materials

Alq3, PBD

Alq3 PBD
HIL, HTL: p-type materials
NPB, TPD

NPB TPB
EML:
Fluorescent dye
DCM2 DCM2

Phosphorescent dye
PtOEP, Ir(ppy)3
Small molecular OLEDs — Electrodes
Anode:
Indium-tin-oxide (ITO): 4.5-5.1 eV
Au: 5.1 eV
Pt: 5.7 eV

Cathode:
Ca: 2.9 eV
Mg: 3.7 eV
Al: 4.3 eV
Ag: 4.3 eV
Mg : Al alloys
Ca : Al Alloys
Small molecular OLEDs — Device preparation

Thermal vacuum evaporation

Substrate Cathode
Vacuum
Electron transport layer
Hole transport layer
Anode
Substrate

Small
molecules Growth:
~10-5-10-7 Torr
Room temperature
Heater
~20 Å- 2000 Å
Polymer OLEDs — Structure and Operation

Cathode Cathode
Emissive polymer Emissive polymer
Anode Conducting polymer
Substrate Anode
Substrate

http://www.ewh.ieee.org/soc/cpmt/presentations/cpmt0401a.pdf
Polymer OLEDs — Materials

Conducting polymers:
PANI:PSS PANI

PDOT:PSS
PSS
PDOT

Emissive polymers:
R-PPV

PFO
Polymer OLEDs — Fabrication

Spin coating
Ink jet printing Spin coating

Screen printing Polymer film

Web coating
Substrate
Ink jet printing

Substrate
Why Organic LED?

 Vibrant colors
 High contrast
 Wide viewing angles from all directions
 Low power consumption
 Low operating voltages
 Wide operating temperature range
 A thin and lightweight form factor
 Cost-effective manufacturability , etc
Applications — Full color OLED display

A full color, 13-inch diagonal small-molecular-weight OLED display with

2mm thickness.

Flexible internet display screen

S. R. Forrest in Nature428, 911 (2004)

Applications — Full color OLED display

Samsung large OLED displays

KODAK OLED displays

http://www.kodak.com/eknec/PageQuerier.jhtml?pq-path=1473/1481/1491&pq-locale=en_US
Applications — Solid state white lighting

White OLEDs

From Universal Display Corporation

http://www.universaldisplay.com/white.htm
Challenges

 Lifetime
Red >10,000 hrs
Green >10,000 hrs
Blue ~1,000hrs ?

 High efficiency ?

 Pure color?