Numerical and experimental studies of mixed-host organic light emitting diodes

• Numerical and experimental studies of mixed-host OLEDs.
• Comparison between conventional heterojunction and mixed-host OLEDs.
• Spatial profiles of electric fields and recombination rates.
• Correlations between current balance factors and current efficiencies of OLEDs.

Electrical characteristic and luminance of three mixed-host organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs): namely the uniformly mixed, step-wise graded and mixed, and continuously graded and mixed, were compared with the conventional hetero-junction OLED in both numerical and experimental studies. These mixed-host OLEDs were fabricated by a mixed-source thermal evaporation process, and half-cell devices were also fabricated to provide some input parameters for OLED simulations. The current efficiencies were largely influenced by their device structures and strongly agreed with the computed current balance factors. The improved mixed-host OLED performances can be discussed with aid from simulations, which include spatial distributions of electron and hole, carrier mobility, electric field profiles, the total recombination rates in the light emitting layer.