Two trans-1-(9-anthryl)-2-phenylethene derivatives as blue-green emitting materials for highly bright organic light-emitting diodes application.

1-(9-Anthryl)-2-phenylethene ( t -APE) is a blue-green material with high fluorescence quantum yield ( Ф f 0.44). However, it is easily crystallized. Herein, Two asymmetric blue-green emitting materials based on t -APE, ( E )-9-(4-(2-(anthracen-9-yl)vinyl)phenyl)-10-(naphthalen-1-yl)anthracene ( 6 ) and ( E )-9-(4-(2-(anthracen-9-yl)vinyl)phenyl)-10-(naphthalen-2-yl)anthracene ( 7 ) were firstly designed and synthesized. The two compounds possess high thermal stability, morphological durability, and bipolar characteristics. The non-doped blue-green organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) using 6 and 7 as emitting layers showed emission at 495 nm, full width at half maximum of 80 nm, maximum brightness of 13,814, 10,579 cd m −2 , maximum current efficiency of 3.62, 7.16 cd A −1 , and Commission Internationale de L'Eclairage (CIE) coordinate of (0.20, 0.43), respectively. Furthermore, when employing 6 and 7 as blue-green emitting layers and rubrene doped in tris-(8-hydroxyquinolinato)aluminum (Alq3) as the orange emitting layers to fabricate white OLEDs (WOLEDs), the WOLEDs exhibit a maximum brightness of 10,984, 14,652 cd m −2 , maximum current efficiency of 2.04, 2.70 cd A −1 , and CIE coordinate of (0.30, 0.40), (0.37, 0.47), Color Rendering Index (CRI) of 65, 60, stable EL spectra, respectively. This study demonstrates that the t -APE-type derivatives have the excellent properties for the emitting materials of OLEDs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]