Organic light-emitting devices fabricated using a premetered coating process

We present the results of a study of flat and uniform organic electroluminescent (EL) layers produced using a simple premetered horizontal-dipping process. It is shown that this process can produce high quality organic semiconductor thin films by utilizing the downstream meniscus of the solution, which may be controlled by adjusting the gap height and the carrying speed. It is also shown that the organic light emitting devices (OLEDs) produced using this method exhibit a peak brightness in excess of 52,000 cd/m(2) and a maximum efficiency of 24 cd/A, with a large active area. From these results, we show that this premetered process for solution coating offers considerable promise for the production of highly efficient, reliable, and large-area solution-processed OLEDs. (C) 2009 Optical Society of America