Zig-Zag Type Molecular Design Strategy of N-Type Hosts for Sky-Blue Thermally-Activated Delayed Fluorescence Organic Light-Emitting Diodes.

N-type hosts for long lifetime in sky-blue thermally-activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) were investigated by synthesizing four hosts with zig-zag-type backbone structure for high triplet energy. The four hosts had two CN units at different positions of the zig-zag-type backbone structure and two dibenzofuran units through either the 2 or 4-position of dibenzofuran. The position of the CN unit was controlled at the meta and para-positions in the zig-zag-type backbone to study the relationship between material parameters and lifetime of the TADF OLEDs. It was revealed that the meta-orientation of the CN units in the backbone was advantageous to extend device lifetime of the sky-blue TADF OLEDs.