Molecular Polaritonics: Controlling photochemistry with quantum optics

Photobleaching is one of the most fundamental and important photochemical reactions, especially in organic optoelectronic devices. This effect can cause permanent damage on the device and limit its performance. It has been recently shown that strongly coupled organic microcavities can be used to alter the excited-state reactivity of molecular materials, and more specifically suppress the photobleaching process. In this research project we aim to investigate the suppression of photobleaching in organic strongly coupled microcavities. We will fabricate and characterize a series of different microcavity structures and benchmark the photobleaching process. Strongly coupled dielectric slab microcavities, containing a number of organic fluorescent materials will be fabricated on top of an inorganic blue light-emitting diode (LED). When the LED is electrically driven, blue electroluminescence will optically excite the strongly coupled organic materials in the slab creating white light emission. Such heterostructures will demonstrate enhanced operational stability due to a change in excited-state reactivity by strong coupling.