Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) have their performance limited by the number of emissive singlet states created upon charge recombination (25%). Recently, a novel strategy has been proposed, based on thermally activated up-conversion of triplet to singlet states, yielding delayed fluorescence (TADF), which greatly enhances electroluminescence. The energy barrier for this reverse intersystem crossing mechanism is proportional to the exchange energy (ΔEST ) between the singlet and triplet states; therefore, materials with intramolecular charge transfer (ICT) states, where it is known that the exchange energy is small, are perfect candidates. However, here it is shown that triplet states can be harvested with 100% efficiency via TADF, even in materials with ΔEST of more than 20 kT (where k is the Boltzmann constant and T is the temperature) at room temperature. The key role played by lone pair electrons in achieving this high efficiency in a series of ICT molecules is elucidated. The results show the complex photophysics of efficient TADF materials and give clear guidelines for designing new emitters.

The efficient synthesis and photophysical properties of a series of ambipolar donor-acceptor-donor systems is described where the acceptor is dibenzothiophene S,S-dioxide and the donor is fluorene, carbazole, or arylamine. The systems exhibit intramolecular charge transfer (ICT) states (of variable ICT character strengths) leading to fluorescence emission ranging from deep blue to green with moderate to high photoluminescence quantum yields. The emission properties can be effectively tuned by systematically changing the position of substitution on both donor and acceptor units (which affects the extent of conjugation) and the redox potentials of the donor units. The results are supported by cyclic voltammetric data and TD-DFT calculations.

We report the synthesis, X-ray crystal structures and photophysics of new donor-acceptor oligomers of fluorene (F) and dibenzothiophene-S,S-dioxide (S) with constrained dihedral angles in the backbone. The materials display bright deep-blue fluorescence and evidence is presented for a planarised intramolecular charge-transfer (PICT) state in the F-S systems.

A new series of donor–bridge–acceptor (D–B–A) compounds consisting of π‐conjugated oligofluorene (oFL) bridges between a ferrocene (Fc) electron‐donor and a fullerene (C60) electron‐acceptor have been synthesized. In addition to varying the length of the bridge (i.e., mono‐ and bi‐fluorene derivatives), four different ways of linking ferrocene to the bridge have been examined. The Fc moiety is linked to oFL: 1) directly without any spacer, 2) by an ethynyl linkage, 3) by a vinylene linkage, and 4) by a p‐phenylene unit. The electronic interactions between the electroactive species have been characterized by cyclic voltammetry, absorption, fluorescence, and transient absorption spectroscopy in combination with quantum chemical calculations. The calculations reveal exceptionally close energy‐matching between the Fc and the oFL units, which results in strong electronic‐coupling. Hence, intramolecular charge‐transfer may easily occur upon exciting either the oFLs or Fcs. Photoexcitation of Fc–oFL–C60 conjugates results in transient radical‐ion‐pair states. The mode of linkage of the Fc and FL bridge has a profound effect on the photophysical properties. Whereas intramolecular charge‐separation is found to occur rather independently of the distance, the linker between Fc and oFL acts (at least in oFL) as a bottleneck and significantly impacts the intramolecular charge‐separation rates, resulting in beta values between βCS 0.08 and 0.19 Å−1. In contrast, charge recombination depends strongly on the electron‐donor–acceptor distance, but not at all on the linker. A value of βCR (0.35±0.01 Å−1) was found for all the systems studied. Oligofluorenes prove, therefore, to be excellent bridges for probing how small structural variations affect charge transport in D–B–A systems.

Random copolymers of poly(9,9-di-n-octylfluorene) (PF8) incorporating 0, 8, 12, 15, and 20% dibenzothiophene (DBT), and copolymers with 2, 5, 8, 12, and 15% dibenzothiophene-S,S-dioxide (S-unit) were synthesised. Absorption and emission spectra of thin films indicate that the DBT system shows a linear decrease of toluene vapour induced β phase with increasing DBT content to a 20% cutoff, whilst in the S-unit copolymers the β phase is present up to 12% co-monomer content, and at 15% the characteristic absorption peak is absent or masked. These results demonstrate the limits, in thin films, at which the β phase can be formed in widely used PF8 copolymer systems for device applications and clearly show that it is practical to use copolymers having electron or hole transport units in the polyfluorene backbone and still be able to form efficient β phase emission sites.