Sky-blue electrogenerated chemiluminescence using anthracene derivatives as host and guest molecules

Abstract

We developed a solution-based sky-blue electrogenerated chemiluminescence (ECL) cell using two kinds of anthracene derivatives. 9,9′-10,10′-Tetraphenyl-2-2′-bianthracene (TPBA) was used as a guest molecule, while 2-tert-butyl-9,10-di(naphth-2-yl)anthracene (TBADN), which emits deep-blue fluorescence, was used as a host molecule. The microfluidic ECL cell with the TPBA-doped TBADN solution exhibited bright emission from TPBA with a maximum luminance of 7.7 cd m−2. By contrast, the ECL intensity was found to be considerably weaker when the host was absent in the solution. We believe that the proposed host-guest solution will contribute to the future development of highly efficient ECL display devices.