Kevin H. Janora

Low temperature metal deposition processes for optoelectronic devices

Photovoltaic cells require deposition of a platinum layer at the cathode to serve as a catalyst for reduction of redox carriers in PV cells. Current dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC) employ high temperature decomposition of chloroplatinic acid to give platinum islands. In order to produce DSSCs with plastic substrates, a low temperature platinum deposition process was developed. Initial experiments showed that platinum was deposited if Karstedt platinum catalyst solution in hexamethyldisilazane (HMDZ) was coated onto a substrate followed by heating under 150°C. PV cell performance of Karstedt-HMDZ-containing platinum was inferior to cells made with high temperature platinum. However, CODPtMe2 (COD = 1,5-cyclooctadiene) was found to be a platinum precursor that led to PV cell performance equivalent to that obtained from high temperature platinum. Other precursors were evaluated as well including MeCpPtMe3 that permitted platinum deposition via UV irradiation. Kelvin Probe analysis was also performed on several platinum films prepared from a variety of precursors on several substrates under a variety of conditions. CPD values of < -0.6eV appeared to predict good PV cell performance. Further application of the low temperature-derived platinum films was made for organic light emitting diodes.

Light extraction from solution processed organic light emitting diodes (presentation video)

Efficient light extraction from organic light emitting diode (OLED) is challenging and efforts are being made to come up with efficient & cost effective outcoupling techniques. We demonstrate 50% EQE entitlement from solution processed white OLEDs compared to 33% EQE observed in devices, implying that there is plenty of room to improve the efficiency of white OLEDs. We present challenges in efficient light extraction from solution processed OLEDs that need to be overcome to close the efficiency gap. We also demonstrate a novel characterization technique that is effective in estimating the light extraction efficiency of outcoupling films and can expedite the selection and optimization of various light extraction approaches without the need to build OLEDs.

High Efficiency, Illumination Quality OLEDs for Lighting

The goal of the program was to demonstrate a 45 lumen per watt white light device based upon the use of multiple emission colors through the use of solution processing. This performance level is a dramatic extension of the teams previous 15 LPW large area illumination device. The fundamental material system was based upon commercial polymer materials. The team was largely able to achieve these goals, and was able to deliver to DOE a 90 lumen illumination source that had an average performance of 34 LPW a 1000 cd/m{sup 2} with peak performances near 40LPW. The average color temperature is 3200K and the calculated CRI 85. The device operated at a brightness of approximately 1000cd/m{sup 2}. The use of multiple emission colors particularly red and blue, provided additional degrees of design flexibility in achieving white light, but also required the use of a multilayered structure to separate the different recombination zones and prevent interconversion of blue emission to red emission. The use of commercial materials had the advantage that improvements by the chemical manufacturers in charge transport efficiency, operating life and material purity could be rapidly incorporated without the expenditure of additional effort. The program was designed to take maximum advantage of the known characteristics of these material and proceeded in seven steps. (1) Identify the most promising materials, (2) assemble them into multi-layer structures to control excitation and transport within the OLED, (3) identify materials development needs that would optimize performance within multilayer structures, (4) build a prototype that demonstrates the potential entitlement of the novel multilayer OLED architecture (5) integrate all of the developments to find the single best materials set to implement the novel multilayer architecture, (6) further optimize the best materials set, (7) make a large area high illumination quality white OLED. A photo of the final deliverable is shown. In 2003, a large area, OLED based illumination source was demonstrated that could provide light with a quality, quantity, and efficiency on par with what can be achieved with traditional light sources. The demonstration source was made by tiling together 16 separate 6-inch x 6-inch blue-emitting OLEDs. The efficiency, total lumen output, and lifetime of the OLED based illumination source were the same as what would be achieved with an 80 watt incandescent bulb. The devices had an average efficacy of 15 LPW and used solution-processed OLEDs. The individual 6-inch x 6-inch devices incorporated three technology strategies developed specifically for OLED lighting -- downconversion for white light generation, scattering for outcoupling efficiency enhancement, and a scalable monolithic series architecture to enable large area devices. The downconversion approach consists of optically coupling a blue-emitting OLED to a set of luminescent layers. The layers are chosen to absorb the blue OLED emission and then luminescence with high efficiency at longer wavelengths. The composition and number of layers are chosen so that the unabsorbed blue emission and the longer wavelength re-emission combine to make white light. A downconversion approach has the advantage of allowing a wide variety of colors to be made from a limited set of blue emitters. In addition, one does not have to carefully tune the emission wavelength of the individual electro-luminescent species within the OLED device in order to achieve white light. The downconversion architecture used to develop the 15LPW large area light source consisted of a polymer-based blue-emitting OLED and three downconversion layers. Two of the layers utilized perylene based dyes from BASF AG of Germany with high quantum efficiency (>98%) and one of the layers consisted of inorganic phosphor particles (Y(Gd)AG:Ce) with a quantum efficiency of {approx}85%. By independently varying the optical density of the downconversion layers, the overall emission spectrum could be adjusted to maximize performance for lighting (e.g. blackbody temperature, color rendering and luminous efficacy) while keeping the properties of the underlying blue OLED constant. The success of the downconversion approach is ultimately based upon the ability to produce efficient emission in the blue. Table 1 presents a comparison of the current performance of the conjugated polymer, dye-doped polymer, and dendrimer approaches to making a solution-processed blue OLED as 2006. Also given is the published state of the art performance of a vapor-deposited blue OLED. One can see that all the approaches to a blue OLED give approximately the same external quantum efficiency at 500 cd/m{sup 2}. However, due to its low operating voltage, the fluorescent conjugated polymer approach yields a superior power efficiency at the same brightness.

Corrosion of Aluminum Metallization Through Flawed Polymer Passivation Layers; In-Situ Microscopy

Aluminum corrosion in a polymer-coated circuit model was studied using in-situ microscopy coupled with time-lapse video recording. Pinholes in the polymer coating and exposure to water with bias voltage of 40V applied between adjacent aluminum tracks resulted in fast anode corrosion, accompanied by gas evolution. A mathematical model is developed that is in good agreement with the observed current-time relationship. The rate of corrosion is controlled by the resistance of a 6000A thick water film occupying the space of the corroded Al film between wafer and polymer coating. A tentative corrosion mechanism is proposed.