Revisiting the Role of Charge Transfer and Local Excitations in Thermally Activated Delayed Fluorescence

Thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) is a phenomenon that relies on the upconversion of triplet excitons to singlet excitons by means of reverse intersystem crossing (rISC). It has been shown both experimentally and theoretically that the TADF mechanism depends on the interplay between charge transfer and local excitations. However, the difference between the diabatic and adiabatic character of the involved excited states is rarely discussed in the literature. Here, we develop a diabatization procedure to implement a 4-state model Hamiltonian to a set of TADF molecules. We provide physical interpretation for the Hamiltonian elements and show their dependence on the electronic state of the equilibrium geometry. We also demonstrate how vibrations affect TADF efficiency by modifying the diabatic decomposition of the molecule. Finally, we provide a simple model that connects the diabatic Hamiltonian to the electronic properties relevant to TADF and show how such relationship translates into different optimization strategies for rISC, fluorescence and overall TADF performance.

Circadian and diel regulation of photosynthesis in the bryophyte Marchantia polymorpha

Circadian rhythms are 24-hour biological cycles that align metabolism, physiology and development with daily environmental fluctuations. Photosynthetic processes are governed by the circadian clock in both flowering plants and cyanobacteria, but it is unclear how extensively this is conserved throughout the green lineage. We investigated the contribution of circadian regulation to photochemistry in Marchantia polymorpha, a liverwort that diverged from flowering plants early in the evolution of land plants. First, we identified in M. polymorpha the circadian regulation of several measures of photosynthetic biochemistry (delayed fluorescence, the rate of photosynthetic electron transport, and non-photochemical quenching of chlorophyll fluorescence). Second, we identified that light-dark cycles increase the robustness of the 24 h cycles of photosynthesis in M. polymorpha, which might be due to the masking of underlying circadian rhythms of photosynthesis by light-dark cycles. Finally, we used a pharmacological approach to identify that chloroplast translation might be necessary for clock control of light harvesting in M. polymorpha. We infer that the circadian regulation of photosynthesis might be well-conserved amongst terrestrial plants.

Probing polaron-induced exciton quenching in TADF based organic light-emitting diodes

Polaron-induced exciton quenching in thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF)-based organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) can lead to external quantum efficiency (EQE) roll-off and device degradation. In this study, singlet-polaron annihilation (SPA) and triplet-polaron annihilation (TPA) were investigated under steady-state conditions and their relative contributions to EQE roll-off were quantified, using experimentally obtained parameters. It is observed that both TPA and SPA can lead to efficiency roll-off in 2,4,5,6-tetra(9H-carbazol-9-yl)isophthalonitrile (4CzIPN) doped OLEDs. Charge imbalance and singlet-triplet annihilation (STA) were found to be the main contributing factors, whereas the device degradation process is mainly dominated by TPA. It is also shown that the impact of electric field-induced exciton dissociation is negligible under the DC operation regime (electric field < 0.5 MV cm−1). Through theoretical simulation, it is demonstrated that improvement to the charge recombination rate may reduce the effect of polaron-induced quenching, and thus significantly decrease the EQE roll-off.

Narrowband Deep-Blue Multi-Resonance Induced Thermally Activated Delayed Fluorescence: Insights from the Theoretical Molecular Design

Multi-resonance thermal activated delayed fluorescence (MR-TADF) has been promising with large oscillator strength and narrow full width at half maxima of luminescence, overcoming the compromise of emission intensity and energy criteria of traditional charge transfer TADF frameworks. However, there are still limited theoretical investigations on the excitation mechanism and systematic molecular manipulation of MR-TADF structures. We systematically study the highly localized excitation (LE) characteristics based on typical blue boron-nitrogen (BN) MR-TADF emitters and prove the potential triangular core with theoretical approaches. A design strategy by extending the planar π-conjugate core structure is proposed to enhance the multiple resonance effects. Moreover, several substituted groups are introduced to the designed core, achieving color-tunable functions with relatively small energy split and strong oscillator strength simultaneously. This work provides a theoretical direction for molecular design strategy and a series of potential candidates for highly efficient BN MR-TADF emitters.