Color Tuning of Efficient Electroluminescence in the Blue and Green Regions Using Heteroleptic Iridium Complexes with 2-Phenoxyoxazole Ancillary Ligands

Abstract

A rational molecular design strategy for tuning the emission color of phosphorescent complexes by functionalization of the bis(2-phenylpyridine)(2-(2′-oxyphenyl)-2-oxazoline/oxazole)iridium(III) framework is reported. Five new complexes (2–6) have been synthesized in good yields and characterized by cyclic voltammetry, absorption, and photoluminescence studies, by time-dependent density functional theory (TD-DFT) calculations, and by single-crystal X-ray diffraction studies for complexes 2, 4, and 6. An interesting feature of the complexes is that the HOMO is localized on the Ir d-orbitals and the phenoxylate part of the “ancillary” ligand, while the LUMO is located on the pyridyl ring of the ppy ligands. A few other complexes containing 2′-oxyphenyl-2-oxazoline/oxazole ancillary ligands have been reported previously; however, until now there has not been a systematic investigation into manipulating this unusual frontier orbital distribution to tune the emissive properties. It is shown that exchanging the...