Theoretical and experimental investigation of exciplex-forming and electroluminescent properties of 4-ethyl-3,5-bis[40-(N, N-diphenylamine)biphenyl-4-yl]-4H-1,2,4-triazole

The recently synthesized 4-ethyl-3,5-bis [40-(N, N-diphenylamine)biphenyl-4-yl]-4H-1,2,4-triazole (TPA-TZ) is in this work thoroughly studied as an efficient luminophore with an account of density functional theory. The intense fluorescence is explained as an intramolecular charge-transfer transition from the diphenylamine (donor) moiety to the central part of the dye with a characteristic electron redistribution in the triazole ring (acceptor). The photoluminescence (PL) and phosphorescence (Ph) spectra of TPA-TZ in the film and in THF solution at 77 K were studied together with the well-known 2,4,6-tris [3-(diphenylphosphinyl)phenyl]-1,3,5-triazine (PO-T2T) dye. The latter compound was used as an electron-withdrawing component of the investigated TPA-TZ: PO-T2T exciplex, which is characterized by a relatively high energy level of the excited lowest triplet state. The films of a solid-state mixture of TPA-TZ and PO-T2T showed exciplex-type emission being slightly red-shifted compared to the PL of the individual donor and acceptor compounds. Two OLED devices with emitting layers of TPA-TZ and of the exciplex-forming molecular mixture of TPA-TZ and PO-T2T were prepared. The exciplex–based OLED demonstrated 4 10³ cd/m² brightness, a current efficiency of 22 cd/A, a power efficiency of 6.77 lm/W, and an external quantum efficiency (EQE) of 7%. This confirms the possibility of triplet harvesting in the molecular mixture of TPA-TZ and PO-T2T, since the theoretical EQE limit for OLED based on the prompt fluorescence is 5%.