Tervalent conducting polymers with tailor-made work functions: Preparation, characterization, and applications as cathodes in electroluminescent devices

A series of conducting polymers have been prepared through thermal polymerization of transition-metal diimine complexes. The as-polymerized material is electrochemically converted into its formally zerovalent form. Due to the proximity of the half-wave potentials of the formal 1+/0 and 0/1 - couples, there is substantial disproportionation of the redox sites at room temperature, resulting in a conductive tervalent mixed-valent material. The redox processes that give rise to this mixed-valent material are predominantly ligand-based, and therefore are highly sensitive to substitution on the ligand periphery. Solution redox chemistry of the monomer can be used to accurately predict the work, function of the corresponding zerovalent conducting polymer, which has been verified by ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy. Many of these materials have especially low work functions (<3.6 eV) making them appropriate materials to use as cathode materials in organic light-emitting devices (OLEDs). Working examples of tris(8-hydroxyquinoline)aluminum(III)-based OLEDs have been fabricated using one of these polymers as a cathode.