Highly flexible transparent electrodes for organic light-emitting diode-based displays

Abstract

Multilayer indium-tin-oxide (ITO)–Ag–ITO stacks were evaluated as transparent conductors for flexible organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays. The ITO–metal–ITO (IMI) samples exhibited significantly reduced sheet resistance over ITO and greater than 80% optical transmission. The IMI films deposited on plastic substrates showed dramatically improved mechanical properties when subjected to bending both as a function of radius of curvature as well as number of cycles to a fixed radius. OLEDs were fabricated on both ITO and IMI anodes, and the devices with IMI anodes showed improved performance at current densities greater than 1mA∕cm2 due to the improved conductivity of the anode.