Polarity-Tunable Host Materials and Their Applications in Thermally Activated Delayed Fluorescence Organic Light-Emitting Diodes.

A series of polarity-tunable host materials were developed based on oligocarbazoles and diphenylphosphine oxide, and their polarities can be tuned through increasing distance of acceptor and donor units. Density functional theory calculations were employed, and photoluminescence spectra in different polar solvents were measured to illustrate different polarities of these host materials. As CZPO has relatively stronger polarity, electroluminescence (EL) spectrum of solution-processed device based on 6 wt % PXZDSO2:CZPO is 7 nm red-shifted relative to that of other host materials based devices. Besides, a comparable impressive external quantum efficiency (EQE) value of 18.7% is achieved for an evaporation-processed yellow device consisting of FCZBn, which is superior to that of the device based on CBP (4,4'-dicarbazolyl-1,1'-biphenyl) (17.0%), and its efficiency roll-off is also obviously reduced, giving an EQE value as high as 16.3% at the luminance of 1000 cd/m. In addition, from CZPO to FCZBn as the polarities of host materials decrease, EL spectra of solution-processed devices based on DMAC-DPS emitter blue-shift constantly from 496 to 470 nm. The current work gives a constructive approach to control EL spectra of organic light-emitting diodes with a fixed thermally activated delayed fluorescence emitter by tuning the polarities of host materials.