In Situ Electroluminescence Color Tuning by Thermal Deprotonation Suitable for Thermal Sensors and Anti-fraud Labels

A novel and versatile approach to tune photoluminescence and electroluminescence by in situ controlled thermal deprotonation is presented. This methodology, based on a single organic π-conjugated material (pyrene derivative), allows the manufacturing of organic light-emitting diode (OLED) prototypes by solution methods with controlled tunable emission ranging from the orange (protonated form of the dye) to the blue (pristine or deprotonated form). While several protonation/deprotonation cycles can be performed on thin films, for the devices only one cycle is possible so that their use as anti-fraud labels can be envisaged. OLEDs exhibit daylight visible brightness of 150 cd m−2 and device lifetime exceeding 30 hours of continuous operation. Thanks to the simplicity of both material design and device fabrication our approach opens new perspectives in the wide field of thermal sensors for customer care or risk perception.