Plasmonic nanomeshes as large-area, low-resistive transparent electrodes and their application to ITO-free organic light-emitting diodes

Here we implement a systematic investigation of two-dimensional silver nanomeshes (AgNMs) for large-area, very low-resistive transparent electrodes and their successful application to ITO-free organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). Experimental results, as well as theoretical analyses with optical and electrical calculation, show that an optimized AgNM electrode fabricated via cost-effective colloidal lithography can have high transmittance and low sheet resistance simultaneously. By using an index-matching concept for further improvement of optical performance, highly transparent AgNM electrodes are achieved at very low sheet resistance (similar to 3.5 Omega/sq). Based on the study regarding transmittance variation of AgNM electrodes embedded in OLEDs, a pertinent index-matching layer is proposed for high performance AgNM-based OLEDs. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.