A substrateless, flexible, and water-resistant organic light-emitting diode

Changmin Keum; Caroline Murawski; Emily Archer; Seonil Kwon; Andreas Mischok; Malte C. Gather

doi:10.1038/s41467-020-20016-3

A substrateless, flexible, and water-resistant organic light-emitting diode

Changmin Keum, Caroline Murawski, Emily Archer, Seonil Kwon, Andreas Mischok, Malte C. Gather^*

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

Despite widespread interest, ultrathin and highly flexible light-emitting devices that can be seamlessly integrated and used for flexible displays, wearables, and as bioimplants remain elusive. Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) with µm-scale thickness and exceptional flexibility have been demonstrated but show insufficient stability in air and moist environments due to a lack of suitable encapsulation barriers. Here, we demonstrate an efficient and stable OLED with a total thickness of ≈ 12 µm that can be fully immersed in water or cell nutrient media for weeks without suffering substantial degradation. The active layers of the device are embedded between conformal barriers formed by alternating layers of parylene-C and metal oxides that are deposited through a low temperature chemical vapour process. These barriers also confer stability of the OLED to repeated bending and to extensive postprocessing, e.g. via reactive gas plasmas, organic solvents, and photolithography. This unprecedented robustness opens up a wide range of novel possibilities for ultrathin OLEDs.

Original language	English
Article number	6250
Number of pages	9
Journal	Nature Communications
Volume	11
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-20016-3
Publication status	Published - 7 Dec 2020

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Final published version, 2.72 MBLicence: CC BY

IBIS: Implantable bioluminescence: IBIS: Implantable bioluminescence interface system for an all-optical neuroprosthesis to the visual cortex
Gather, M. C. (PI)
7/06/17 → 6/06/18
Project: Standard
H2020 MSCA Fellowship NeurOLED: H2020 MSCA Fellowship (Caroline Murawski)
Gather, M. C. (PI)
European Commission
1/03/16 → 19/07/18
Project: Fellowship

A substrateless, flexible, and water-resistant organic light-emitting diode (dataset)
Keum, C. (Creator), Murawski, C. (Creator), Archer, E. (Creator), Kwon, S. (Creator), Mischok, A. (Creator) & Gather, M. C. (Creator), University of St Andrews, 7 Dec 2020
DOI: 10.17630/ada14451-b64c-4aaf-8ed1-915116e8ec5f
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title = "A substrateless, flexible, and water-resistant organic light-emitting diode",

abstract = "Despite widespread interest, ultrathin and highly flexible light-emitting devices that can be seamlessly integrated and used for flexible displays, wearables, and as bioimplants remain elusive. Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) with µm-scale thickness and exceptional flexibility have been demonstrated but show insufficient stability in air and moist environments due to a lack of suitable encapsulation barriers. Here, we demonstrate an efficient and stable OLED with a total thickness of ≈ 12 µm that can be fully immersed in water or cell nutrient media for weeks without suffering substantial degradation. The active layers of the device are embedded between conformal barriers formed by alternating layers of parylene-C and metal oxides that are deposited through a low temperature chemical vapour process. These barriers also confer stability of the OLED to repeated bending and to extensive postprocessing, e.g. via reactive gas plasmas, organic solvents, and photolithography. This unprecedented robustness opens up a wide range of novel possibilities for ultrathin OLEDs.",

author = "Changmin Keum and Caroline Murawski and Emily Archer and Seonil Kwon and Andreas Mischok and Gather, {Malte C.}",

note = "This research was financially supported from the Leverhulme Trust (RPG-2017-231), the EPSRC NSF-CBET lead agency agreement (EP/R010595/1, 1706207), the DARPA NESD programme (N66001-17-C-4012) and the RS Macdonald Charitable Trust. C.K. acknowledges support from the Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education (2017R1A6A3A03012331). C.M. acknowledges funding from the European Commission through a Marie Sk{\l}odowska Curie individual fellowship (703387). A.M. acknowledges funding through an individual fellowship of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (404587082). M.C.G. acknowledges funding from the Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung (Humboldt-Professorship).",

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AU - Gather, Malte C.

N1 - This research was financially supported from the Leverhulme Trust (RPG-2017-231), the EPSRC NSF-CBET lead agency agreement (EP/R010595/1, 1706207), the DARPA NESD programme (N66001-17-C-4012) and the RS Macdonald Charitable Trust. C.K. acknowledges support from the Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education (2017R1A6A3A03012331). C.M. acknowledges funding from the European Commission through a Marie Skłodowska Curie individual fellowship (703387). A.M. acknowledges funding through an individual fellowship of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (404587082). M.C.G. acknowledges funding from the Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung (Humboldt-Professorship).

PY - 2020/12/7

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N2 - Despite widespread interest, ultrathin and highly flexible light-emitting devices that can be seamlessly integrated and used for flexible displays, wearables, and as bioimplants remain elusive. Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) with µm-scale thickness and exceptional flexibility have been demonstrated but show insufficient stability in air and moist environments due to a lack of suitable encapsulation barriers. Here, we demonstrate an efficient and stable OLED with a total thickness of ≈ 12 µm that can be fully immersed in water or cell nutrient media for weeks without suffering substantial degradation. The active layers of the device are embedded between conformal barriers formed by alternating layers of parylene-C and metal oxides that are deposited through a low temperature chemical vapour process. These barriers also confer stability of the OLED to repeated bending and to extensive postprocessing, e.g. via reactive gas plasmas, organic solvents, and photolithography. This unprecedented robustness opens up a wide range of novel possibilities for ultrathin OLEDs.

AB - Despite widespread interest, ultrathin and highly flexible light-emitting devices that can be seamlessly integrated and used for flexible displays, wearables, and as bioimplants remain elusive. Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) with µm-scale thickness and exceptional flexibility have been demonstrated but show insufficient stability in air and moist environments due to a lack of suitable encapsulation barriers. Here, we demonstrate an efficient and stable OLED with a total thickness of ≈ 12 µm that can be fully immersed in water or cell nutrient media for weeks without suffering substantial degradation. The active layers of the device are embedded between conformal barriers formed by alternating layers of parylene-C and metal oxides that are deposited through a low temperature chemical vapour process. These barriers also confer stability of the OLED to repeated bending and to extensive postprocessing, e.g. via reactive gas plasmas, organic solvents, and photolithography. This unprecedented robustness opens up a wide range of novel possibilities for ultrathin OLEDs.

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A substrateless, flexible, and water-resistant organic light-emitting diode

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IBIS: Implantable bioluminescence: IBIS: Implantable bioluminescence interface system for an all-optical neuroprosthesis to the visual cortex

H2020 MSCA Fellowship NeurOLED: H2020 MSCA Fellowship (Caroline Murawski)

Datasets

A substrateless, flexible, and water-resistant organic light-emitting diode (dataset)

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