Issue 23, 2016

Dimesitylboryl-functionalized tetraphenylethene derivatives: efficient solid-state luminescent materials with enhanced electron-transporting ability for nondoped OLEDs

Abstract

Organic electroluminescent materials that can simultaneously serve as light-emitting and electron-transporting layers in one organic light-emitting diode (OLED) are very useful for simplifying device configuration, but there are not many. In this work, three tailored luminescent materials (TPE-DB, TPE-BPDB and TPE-TPDB) adopting tetraphenylethene (TPE) and dimesitylboryl groups as the π-conjugated backbone and the electron-deficient functional group, respectively, are synthesized and fully characterized. Their thermal, photophysical, electronic, electrochemical, and electroluminescent properties are investigated systematically. The results reveal that these new dimesitylboryl-functionalized TPE derivatives feature aggregation-induced emission (AIE) characteristics with high fluorescence quantum yields of 81–86% in solid films. They possess high glass-transition temperatures of 134–168 °C and very low LUMO energy levels down to −2.9 eV. The OLED device [ITO/HATCN (20 nm)/NPB (40 nm)/TPE-DB (60 nm)/LiF (1 nm)/Al (100 nm)] that is fabricated by adopting TPE-DB as both the light emitter and electron transporter exhibits excellent electroluminescent performance, with high efficiencies of up to 13.5 cd A−1 and 4.6%, which are advanced noticeably relative to those attained from the device with an additional electron-transporting layer (TPBi). The results demonstrate that these new TPE derivatives are promising n-type solid-state luminescent materials with practical utility in nondoped OLEDs.

Graphical abstract: Dimesitylboryl-functionalized tetraphenylethene derivatives: efficient solid-state luminescent materials with enhanced electron-transporting ability for nondoped OLEDs

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
06 Apr 2016
Accepted
09 May 2016
First published
10 May 2016

J. Mater. Chem. C, 2016,4, 5241-5247

Dimesitylboryl-functionalized tetraphenylethene derivatives: efficient solid-state luminescent materials with enhanced electron-transporting ability for nondoped OLEDs

L. Chen, G. Lin, H. Peng, H. Nie, Z. Zhuang, P. Shen, S. Ding, D. Huang, R. Hu, S. Chen, F. Huang, A. Qin, Z. Zhao and B. Z. Tang, J. Mater. Chem. C, 2016, 4, 5241 DOI: 10.1039/C6TC01383J

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