Quinoline-based aggregation-induced delayed fluorescence materials for highly efficient non-doped organic light-emitting diodes

Three new emitters, namely 10,10'-(quinoline-2,8-diyl)bis(10H-phenoxazine) (Fene), 10,10'-(quinoline-2,8-diyl)bis(10H-phenothiazine) (Fens) and 10,10'-(quinoline-2,8-diyl)bis(9,9-dimethyl-9,10-dihydroacridine) (Yad), featuring quinoline as a new electron acceptor have been designed and conveniently synthesized. These emitters possessed small singlet–triplet splitting energy (ΔE_st) and twisted structures, which not only endowed them show thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) properties but also afforded a remarkable aggregation-induced emission (AIE) feature. Moreover, they also showed aggregation-induced delayed fluorescence (AIDF) property and good photoluminescence (PL) property, which are the ideal emitters for non-doped organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). Furthermore, high-performance non-doped OLEDs based on Fene, Fens and Yad were achieved, and excellent maximum external quantum efficiencies (EQE_max) of 14.9%, 13.1% and 17.4%, respectively, were obtained. It was also found that all devices exhibited relatively low turn-on voltages ranging from 3.0 V to 3.2 V probably due to their twisted conformation and the AIDF properties. These results demonstrated the quinoline-based emitters could have a promising application in non-doped OLEDs.