A direction to increasing photovoltaic performances of dye sensitized solar cells (DSC) is proposed. An interface between TiO2/dye and an electrolyte layer is focused on. It is proved that better coverage of TiO2 layers with dye molecules increases photovoltaic performances, where dye staining is carried out in pressurized CO2 atmosphere. This is explained by decreases in the amount of surface traps on TiO2 nano-particles, which is discussed by thermally stimulated current (TSC). The decrease in the surface trap density increases electron diffusion coefficient and improves electron lifetime in TiO2 layers. In addition, the TiO2-staining with dye molecules having the larger dipole moment seems to leave less amount of electron trap. Another crucial research item is solidification. Quasi-solidification is carried out by using surface modified anodically-oxidized Al2O3 films filled with ionic liquids, where ion paths are fabricated on the surface-modified Al2O3 walls by concentrating iodine and iodide molecules on the walls. Because of the fabrication of the ion path, photovoltaic performances increased even after solidification. Grötthuss type mechanism is introduced to explain the increase in the photovoltaic performances after the solidification.

Organic thin film devices are of interest for a variety of forthcoming ubiquitous electronics applications. In order to build ubiquitous high-performance devices, it is necessary to fabricate crystalline thin films of various organic materials onto “ubiquitous substrates” that are dictated by applications. However, many organic thin films crystallize only on a limited selection of substrates. Unfortunately, promising organic molecules, which have a large overlap of pi-orbitals between molecules, cannot migrate freely on a substrate because of stronger cohesion between molecules than interaction between the molecule and the substrate. Therefore, enhancement of the molecule-substrate interaction, i.e. ‘molecular wettability’ should promote crystallization. We found that an ultrasmooth monolayer of pentacene (C22H14), which can be grown on many general dielectric substrates, changes the molecular wettability of a substrate for other poorly wettable organic materials. We also demonstrate that a field effect transistor (FET) using a crystalline C60 thin film on a pentacene-buffered substrate can have a mobility of 4.9 cm2/Vs, which is 5-fold higher than that of C60 FETs without the buffer. Molecular wetting-controlled substrates can thus offer a general solution to the fabrication of high-performance crystalline plastic and molecular electronics.

In this paper, we measured and analyzed the operation lifetime of a high efficiency blue OLED which consists of N,N' –Vdiphenyl -N,N'-bis(1-napthyl) -1,1'-biphenyl-4,4'- diamine (NPB) as the hole-transport layer (HTL), 4,4'-bis[2-(4-(N,N-diphenylamino)phenyl)vinyl]biphenyl (DPAVBi) doped in 9,10-bis(2';-naphthyl) anthracene (ADN) as the emitting layer (EML), and bis(10-hydroxyben-zo[h]quinolinato)beryllium (Bebq2) as the electron-transport layer (ETL). Due to the high electron mobility of the ETL (one order of magnitude higher than Alq3), the carrier balance is achieved and a blue OLED with a high external quantum efficiency of 8.32% is obtained. The device structure of our blue OLED device is ITO /HTL (40nm)/EML (45nm, 4% dopant)/ETL (15nm)/ LiF(1.2nm)/Al (100nm). In our operation lifetime measurement, we fixed the initial luminescence of the blue OLEDs at 12500, 10000, 7000, 5000 cd/m2 with a constant current driving. The resulting half-lifetime are 5.58, 16.56, 27, 109.819 hours, respectively. To estimate the half-lifetime of this device, we use a well-known relation in our fitting: L*t1/2n= constant where n is the acceleration coefficient, and t1/2 is the half-lifetime. In our blue OLED, the n value is 3.088. By using the equation, we can calculate that the estimated half lifetime at an initial luminance of 1000 cd/m2 achieves 15611 hours in our device. For further investigating the lifetime mechanism in our blue OLED, we fit all the luminance versus time curves obtained under different driving condition. We found that luminance is inversely proportional to the square of the time, rather than a typically stretched exponential decay which means the luminance decay is a second-order reaction in our blue OLED.

We report an ab initio study of a photochromic dithienylethene derivative. The mechanisms for switching between open and closed conformations are investigated based on total energy calculations for the ground and excited state. An explanation for the central ring closure based on relaxation of the excited state is presented.

A bistable effects of Au nano-crystals embedded in poly(N-vinylcarbazole) (PVK) were observed. Subsequently we investigated dependency of the nonvolatile memory behavior on curing temperature for the Au nano-crystals embedded in the PVK. For the study, in the devices of different curing temperatures we measured current-voltage characteristics for the devices and investigated the formation of the Au nano-crystals using cross sectional transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The nonvolatile memory behavior depends on the curing temperature, which is attributed to the suitable formation of the Au nano-crystal.

Poly(p-phenylenevinylene) (PPV) thin films were prepared by using drop casting under high gravity condition and p- and n-type PPV based field effect transistors (FET) have been fabricated. PPV FETs with gold source-drain electrodes showed the p-channel FET conduction. The FET characteristics of PPV were improved by annealing and the field-effect hole mobility was 8.8×10−4cm2V−1s−1. On the other hand, PPV FET with calcium source-drain electrodes showed the n-channel FET conduction and the field-effect electron mobility was 1.0×10−6cm2V−1s−1.

The aromatic core of perylene bisimides can be twisted by chemical substitution with chlorine in the bay-position. An example for this strategy is 1,6,7,10-tetra-chloro-N,N'-dimethyl-perylene-tetracarboxylic-bisimide, Cl4MePTCDI. This twisting leads to a decrease in directed intermolecular interactions, which causes a decrease in the electronic coupling of the molecules, interesting to be investigated in thin films of this molecular semiconductor. An amorphous solid phase was formed by physical vapor deposition. This amorphous phase showed the tendency to crystallize under ambient conditions as apparent von optical microscopy at the films. The crystallized phase was investigated by atomic force microscopy AFM and optical methods, where a formation of weak excimers was found.

The color purity of blue polyfluorene fluorescence emission is often adversely contaminated by green emission bands. The origin of this green emission has been attributed to various factors including on-chain oxidation of fluorene leading to monomeric fluorenone emission and inter/intra-chain interaction between segments of fluorenone units leading to excimer formation on the polyfluorene backbone. We report here emission properties at the bulk and single molecule level of a molecular fluorene derivative and compare them to those of its oxidative fluorenone derivative. Whereas the bulk fluorescence emission of 2,7-bis(3,4,5-trimethoxyphenylethenyl)-9,9-diethyl-9H-fluorene (OFPV) exhibits a blue to blue-green emission at about 480 nm, 2,7-bis(3,4,5-trimethoxyphenylethenyl)-9,9-diethyl-9H-fluorenone (OFOPV) shows red luminescence with a peak centered at about 630 nm. However, the peak position for OFOPV shifts to higher energies (∼540 nm) upon dilution or dispersion in polymer matrices like PMMA or Zeonex. Single molecule measurements of OFOPV show fluorescence spectra dominated by peaks around 540 nm, with a small minority at longer wavelengths that are attributed to emission from dimers or higher aggregates. This distribution indicates that monomeric emission of OFOPV is green, consistent with green emission bands seen in polyfluorenes.

The photo FET having a photosensitive insulator layer showed excellent photo-switching properties upon illuminating the gate dielectric layer, because the gate capacitor was rapidly charged up by providing a large amount of photo-generated charges in the dielectric layer to the gate capacitor. In this study, we have tried to give a memory function to the photo FET. Further, we have tried to fabricate flexible photo FETs by using only solution processes in order to utilize the photo FET as flexible photo sensor and photo memory devices. As a result, we have succeeded in observing the memory effect of the photo FET and the photo-switching behavior of the flexible photo FETs

We have demonstrated organic thin-film transistor devices on synthesis paper of polypropylene (PP). All the fabrications are in solution-based processes except electrodes. As a barrier and smoother layer, photosensitive epoxy, 5μm-thich was coated on the paper substrate by using slit die coating. Polyvinyl phenol (PVP) was mixed with poly (melamine-co-formaldehyde) methylated, filmed by spin coating and ultraviolet (UV) cross linked to provide the gate dielectric layer. Using poly (3-hexylthiophene) as an active layer, a high-performance organic transistor with field effect mobility up to 0.006 cm2/ V s and an on/off ratio of 50 can be achieved. For the applications in flexible and disposable electronics, to built organic transistors on a cheap synthesis paper substrate can extremely lower the cost.

We have fabricated C60 thin films on various substrates (mica, MoS2, HOPG, LiF, NaCl, KBr, KCl and CaF2) by using continuous-wave laser molecular beam epitaxy (CWL-MBE), which is very suitable technique to grow epitaxial organic thin films because of good controllability of evaporation as compared with Knudsen-cell method. The films were evaluated by reflection high-energy electron diffraction with micro channel imaging plate (MCP-RHEED) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). AFM images of the C60 films on mica, MoS2 and HOPG substrates show flat and homogeneous, morphology, and epitaxial growth of the films on mica and MoS2 substrates were observed by RHEED. This result shows mica, MoS2, HOPG substrates are good candidates for epitaxial growth of C60 thin films.

High reproducible electrical bistability was observed and we deliberated its working mechanism through measurements of dynamic dielectric response in single organic layer sandwiched structure using top Ag electrode. The electrical transition between high-impedance state (OFF state) and low-impedance state (ON state) happened by the change of applied voltage patterns. Distinction between the OFF state and the ON state was not induced by change of static charge accumulation but reflected the difference of the response of mobile electric careers in the organic film. We proposed plausible working mechanism of transition from the pristine state to the bistable state. Namely, the electrical bistable state of our device is generated by penetration of Ag nanoparticles and creation of charge pathways across the organic film.

1-Phenyl-3-naphthyl-5-((dimethylamino)phenyl)-2-pyrazoline with different diameters of 40 - 190 nm were prepared by the reprecipitation method and polymerized with poly(methyl methacrylate-co-ethylene glycol dimethacrylate) using cationic surfactants for full color electronic paper, which is expected to substitute for the future display. The electronic ink particles of pyrazoline organic nanoparticles polymerized by poly(methylmethacrylate-co-ethylene glycol dimethacrylate) were prepared and monodispersed successfully in aqueous alcohol medium. The size of mono-dispersed electronic ink particles is from 160 to 550 nm. The ink particle size was found to decrease with increasing concentration of the surfactant. The effect of surfactant was significant. The appropriate additions of surfactants result in an increase in electrophoretic mobility. The electrophoretic mobility of the resulting electronic inks was −7.5 to −3.6 × 10−5 cm2/ V·s in the presence of surfactants.

This paper reports the recent results of a transmission electron microscopy study of cold-welded and e-beam deposited Au-Ag interfaces. Dust particles were observed to be embedded between the cold-welded interfaces. These are shown to amplify the defect regions caused by surface asperities. Electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS) analysis revealed that there was no significant diffusion zone across the cold welding interface. However, sub-micron mechanical twining structures were revealed by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) analyses. These were found to penetrate through both the cold-welded and control Au-Ag interfaces, but with different orientations.

Two charged organometallic complexes containing bulky hydrophobic ligands based on ruthenium (II) and iridium (III) were synthesized and their performance in solid state light emitting electrochemical cells is described. The complexes were chosen as due to their large ligands a diminished susceptibility towards the formation of destructive complexes during device operation is expected. The LEC device performances reveal the longest living devices reported so far under dc bias. Quantum chemical calculations confirm that the major effect of the bulky diphenylphenanthroline ligands is of steric origin and not related with changes in the molecular electronic structure of the complexes.

Spectroscopic ellipsometry is one of the most accurate and reliable optical technique to characterize polymers, liquid crystals (LCs) and organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs). Because these devices are formed by complex structure including optical anisotropy, absorbing and graded materials, the correct use of spectroscopic ellipsometer required a combination of the proper choice of hardware and the appropriate ellipsometric model. In this work, we presents ellipsometric results obtained by a commercially available phase modulated spectroscopic ellipsometer (PMSE) on a full TFT-LCD structure characterized from UV to NIR. As expected, strong anisotropy and inhomogeneous optical properties were found respectively on LCs and ITO materials. We also presents measurements of film thickness and optical constants of each layer constituing an OLED structure

Radiative recombination processes provide valuable information about exciton dynamics and allow detection of defects in rubrene crystals. We demonstrate that the photoluminescence spectra of crystalline rubrene reflect exciton dissociation through oxygen-related defects in addition to the direct exciton recombination. The defect-assisted exciton dissociation results in a well-defined photoluminescence band. These defects play an important role in charge transport. Dark- and photo-conductivity is higher in rubrene crystals with a large density of the defects. The observations strongly suggest that the oxygen-related defect forms a bandgap state and acts as an acceptor center in crystalline rubrene.

We report the fabrication and characterization of the bottom contact organic thin film transistors and inverter based on a heterostructure of C60 on pentacene. The transistor shows ambipolar transport characteristics with high electron and hole mobilities of 0.23 cm2V−1s−1 and 0.14 cm2V−1s−1, respectively. After exposure to air, the n-channel in C60 is completely degraded whereas the p-channel in pentacene keeps working. Both the n-channel and the p-channel are stable in N2 atmosphere. The inverter exhibits typical transfer characteristics, which are interpreted by the distribution of the accumulated electrons and holes depending on the bias conditions. These results suggest a potential way to fabricate organic complementary circuits with a single organic heterostructure device.

Controlling the polarization state of fluorescence emission in solid state devices is an important goal in optical display technologies. High-purity (right or left) circular polarized emission is particularly desirable because an arbitrary linearly polarized state can be generated with much higher efficiency (lower loss) as compared with a non-polarized fluorescence input. Here we discuss observation of resonant chiroptical effects (fluorescence detected circular dichroism (FDCD), and circular polarized luminescence (CPL)) from single (bridged-triarylamine) helicene molecules in a solid-film format. In the FDCD experiment using 457-nm excitation – an excitation wavelength where the bulk circular dichroism is negligible – single-molecule fluorescence from enantiomerically pure helicene samples show surprising distribution of dissymmetry (g) parameters centered near zero but with a significant contribution from molecules showing an almost perfectly pure response to either right or left circularly polarized light. Experiments combining a well-defined circularly polarized excitation (either right or left) with decomposition of the fluorescence into left- and right-circular polarization component show only a weak correlation between the dissymmetry (sign and magnitude) of the CPL with the polarization state of the input. Current efforts are directed at wavelength resolved CPL, FDCD at wavelengths that are more closely match to bulk circular dichroism features, and orientational dependence of FDCD and CPL. These results provide new insight into chiroptical properties of chiral fluorophores at the single molecule level and suggests new optical device possibilities with chiral fluorophores.

We investigated the electronic structure and the energy level alignment at the interfaces between perylene-3,4,9,10-tetracarboxylic dianhydride (PTCDA) and metals (Au, Cu and Co) by ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy (UPS). In the case of PTCDA/Au interface, the apparent interface states and charge transfer (CT) states were not observed in its UPS spectra. In the case of PTCDA/Cu and Co interfaces, however, we found that the CT from metal to PTCDA occurred, and that the apparent CT states were observed at PTCDA/Cu interface.