Tunable, Full-Color Electroluminescent Array

BACKGROUND: A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits visible light when an electric current passes through it. Traditionally, LEDs were made with inorganic materials. However, inorganic semiconductor LEDs lack ease of processibility on large and flexible substrates. In the last decade, Organic LEDs (OLEDs) have become very popular with their diversity, easy processibility and possibility of fabrication on flexible and large area displays. But organic LEDs suffer from fundamental issues of stability and color purity. In addition, both LEDs and OLEDs lack easy color tunability. Therefore, researchers have started to experiment with Hybrid Organic-Inorganic Light Emitting Diodes.

DESCRIPTION: Researchers at the University of California have developed Hybrid Organic-Inorganic LEDs based on colloidal semiconductor nanocrystals (QDs). QDs have narrow band emission and their color emission can be tuned in the full visible spectrum by varying their size. QDs also have easy processibility and can be laid into thin films by simple techniques. By integrating QDs with polymers on a nanometer scale, the researchers were able to build tunable, full color LEDs with a low voltage threshold.

ADVANTAGES:

* Allows the emission color of each pixel to be tuned in the full visible spectrum * Operates at a lower threshold voltage than other QD LEDs.

APPLICATIONS: The new LEDs could be useful in a wide range of optoelectronic applications, from flat screen televisions to biosensors.

REFERENCE: 2003-013

Patents:
US 7,132,787   [MORE INFO]

Type of Offer: Licensing



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