Technical / Research

The UK launches a new project that aims to improve airtight bonding in OLED lighting devices

The UK innovation agency (Innovate UK) has launched a new 30-month project called UltraWELD, which aims to improve airtight bonding in OLED lighting for aerospace and defense applications. The project partners will develop photonic-based processes for highly dissimilar material joining.

UltraWELD - OLED OPV prototyping line at the CPI

Current dissimilar materials joining is mainly done using adhesive bonding - a highly flexible and low cost process, but one that cannot provide truly hermetic bonds, which reduces the performance of the panels and can lead to optical damage.

Read the full story Posted: Aug 08, 2018

Fraunhofer researchers use electron beam to micro-pattern OLED microdisplays

Researchers from the Fraunhofer FEP institute developed a new micro-patterning process using an electron beam to produce OLED microdisplays on silicon substrates. This could enable a new way to produce direct-emission OLED microdisplays, which will be more efficient and bright compared to the current ones that use color filters.

Electron Beam Patterning for OLED microdisplays (Fraunhofer)

The electron beam patterning is performed after the encapsulation step - the beam goes through the encapsulation layer and can be used to modify the emission of the OLED materials. To create red, green, and blue pixels, an organic layer of the OLED itself is ablated by a thermal electron beam process.

Read the full story Posted: Aug 07, 2018

Kyushu University researchers use singlet fission to achieve near-infrared OLED emitters with >100% IQE

Researchers from Japan's Kyushu University developed a new technology called singlet fission that enables near-infrared OLED materials to surpass the 100% limit for exciton production - or achieve an internal quantum efficiency (IQE) of over 100%. Singlet fission was already used in OPVs, but this is the first time that it was demonstrated with OLEDs.

SInglet fission OLED process, Kyushu University

Achieving over 100% is possible because at 100% IQE all charges form excitons that emit light. The new technique splits the energy from a high-energy excitons into two low level ones. The new OLED emitter materials use molecules in which singlets can transfer half of their energy to neighboring molecules while keeping half of the energy for themselves - each singlet creates two triplets. The emitters emit near-infrared light.

Read the full story Posted: Jul 08, 2018

The Fraunhofer FEP develops a new technology to produce ultra-smooth polymer films

The Fraunhofer FEP announced that it developed a new technology to produce ultra-smooth polymer films. The new technology can be used to produce low-defect density films in a roll-to-roll based process, suitable for a wide range of applications - including encapsulation films, touch layers and as OLED substrates.

Fraunhofer OptiPerm ultra-smooth polymer films photo

This technology was developed as part of the EU-funded OptiPerm project. The Fraunhofer researchers say that this new innovative process does not require any special processing environment and could be used under standard factory conditions.

Read the full story Posted: Jun 30, 2018

Motorola patents a technology to fix low-temperature foldable display deformation

Motorola has been granted an interesting patent that aims to solve screen deformation with foldable displays. Motorola says that one of the issues with foldable displays is that they deform in low temperatures.

Motorola heating-hinge foldable OLED patent photo

Motorola suggests using a temperature sensor that detects when the display is deformed, and then the hinge is heated so that the display is automatically corrected. This could be used to create foldable OLEd phones that bend both inward and outwards, and can work with more than one hinge (so that you can fold a display several times).

Read the full story Posted: Jun 19, 2018

Researchers demonstrate Kirigami-inspired 3D OLED lighting devices

Researchers from Penn State University have demonstrated 3D OLED lighting devices, inspired by the Japanese Kirigami art of paper cutting the folding.

Penn State University, Kirigami OLED lighting

The researchers started with flexible OLED lighting devices produced on thin plastics, which they then cut and folded to create lighting-emitting 3D structures.

Read the full story Posted: Jun 17, 2018

Researchers increase OLED efficiency by over 15% by using ultra-stable film formation

Researchers from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and TU-Dresden have demonstrated that ultra-stable film formation can be used to to improve the performance of OLED devices.

Ultra-stable film formation to improve OLEDs

The researchers grew (using evaporation) the organic materials as ultrastable glasses - a growth condition that allows for thermodynamically most stable amorphous solids. Testing four different phosphorescent emitters, the researchers show significant (over 15%) increases of efficiency and operational stability. The researchers also say that these growing conditions are expected to even be more useful for TADF materials.

Read the full story Posted: Jun 02, 2018

Researchers develop a sub-electrode micro-lens array that can increase the light output in OLEDs by a factor of 3

Researchers from the University of Michigan developed a new method to cost-effectively extra more light out of OLED displays. To achieve that, the researchers used a Sub-Electrode Micro-Lens Array (SEMLA) placed between the bottom transparent ITO electrode and the glass substrate. Testing on green and white PHOLEDs, the researchers say the SEMLA enhanced light output by a factor of 2.8 (green) and 3.1 (white) compared to a similar device without the lens array.

OLED micro-lens array (Michigan)

The researcher say that such an array can be fully transparent and has no impact on the sharpness of the display. The hexagonal array of 10 μm lenses can be fabricated using conventional photolithography methods which are quite cost effective. Such a micro-lens array does not change the actual OLED production process.

Read the full story Posted: Apr 30, 2018

Researchers use 2D MoS2 to create transistors that can drive OLED displays

Researchers from Yonsei University managed to use a graphene-like 2D material called Molybdenum Disulfide (MoS₂) to create a transistor that can drive flexible OLED displays.

The researcher created a 6x6 OLED pixel array on a 7 mm plastic substrate that is so bendable (1 mm radius) it can be used as a skin sticker as can be seen in the video above.

Read the full story Posted: Apr 23, 2018

Samsung researchers study the degradation of blue PHOLED materials, offer new design strategies for longer lasting blue emitters

Researchers from Samsung Electronics and the Ewha Womans University in Korea collaborated in a new study of the degradation in blue phosphorescence OLED materials. This study demonstrate the importance of controlling exciton-induced electron transfer, and more importantly provides strategies for the design of longer-lasting blue PHOLED materials.

Degradation study of blue PHOLED, exciton-inducted (Samsung/Ewha)

The researchers say that the study reveals the charge-neutral generation of polaron pairs (radical ion pairs) by electron transfer from the dopant to host excitons. According to the study, device lifetime correlates linearly with the rate constant for the annihilation of the radical ion pair.

Read the full story Posted: Mar 25, 2018