Efficient Organic Upconversion Devices for Low Energy Consumption and High-Quality Noninvasive Imaging.

Du, Xiaoyang; Han, Jiayue; He, Zeyu; Han, Chao; Wang, Xiaomu; Wang, Jun; Jiang, Yadong; Tao, Silu · Adv Mater · 2021

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Infrared upconversion devices (UCDs) enable low-cost visualization of infrared optical signals without utilizing a readout circuit, which is of great significance for biological recognition and noninvasive dynamic monitoring. However, UCDs suffer from inferior photon to photon (p-p) efficiency and high turn-on voltage (V<sub>on</sub> ) for upconversion operation, hindering a further expansion in highly resolved infrared imaging. Herein, an efficient organic UCD integrating an interfacial exciplex emitter and a well-designed near-infrared (NIR) detector reveals a high efficiency up to 12.92% and a low V<sub>on</sub> down to 1.56 V. The low V<sub>on</sub> gives the capacity for detecting weak NIR light down to 3.2 µW cm<sup>-2</sup> , significantly expanding the detection power scale of UCDs. Thus, the imaging linear dynamic range (I-LDR) is highly bias-tunable, ranging from 13.23 to 84.4 dB. The high I-LDR enables highly resolved and strong-penetration bioimaging especially for thick biological sections, indicating great potential in noninvasive defect and pathological detection.

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