Polymer light-emitting diodes placed in microcavities

The use of resonant optical microcavities to influence the emission properties of conjugated polymer light-emitting diodes (LEDs) is reported. The microcavities, which are built using metallic mirrors and polymeric spacers, incorporate polymer LEDs in between the mirrors. We report experimental results of polymer LEDs based on substituted polythiophenes. The effects include substantial narrowing of the spectral width of the emitted light, enhancement of the emission at the microcavity resonance, and coupling of two emission processes to different resonance modes in the same cavity.