A Self‐Assembled 3D Penetrating Nanonetwork for High‐Performance Intrinsically Stretchable Polymer Light‐Emitting Diodes

Abstract The emergence of wearable technology can significantly benefit from electronic displays fabricated using intrinsically stretchable (is‐) materials. Typically, an improvement in the stretchability of conventional light‐emitting polymers is accompanied by a decrease in charge transportability, thus resulting in a significant decrease in device efficiency. In this study, a self‐assembled 3D penetrating nanonetwork is developed to achieve increased stretchability and mobility simultaneously, based on high‐molecular‐weight phenylenevinylene (L‐SY‐PPV) and polyacrylonitrile (PAN). The mobility of L‐SY‐PPV/PAN increases by 5–6 times and the stretchability increases from 20% (pristine L‐SY‐PPV film) to 100%. A high current efficiency (CE) of 8.13 cd A⁻¹ is observed in polymer light‐emitting diodes (PLEDs) fabricated using 40% stretched L‐SY‐PPV/PAN. Furthermore, using a polyethyleneimine ethoxylated (PEIE), an 1,10‐phenanthroline monohydrate (pBphen), and a reduced Triton X‐100 (TR) chelated Zn‐based is‐ electron‐injection layer of Zn‐PEIE‐pBphen‐TR, an is‐PLED is realized with a turn‐on voltage of 6.5 V and a high CE of 2.35 cd A⁻¹. These results demonstrate the effectiveness of using the self‐assembled 3D penetrating nanonetwork for the fabrication of is‐PLEDs.