Thin film passivation of organic light emitting diodes by inductively coupled plasma chemical vapor deposition

The characteristics of an SiN x passivation layer grown by a specially designed inductively coupled plasma chemical vapor deposition (ICP-CVD) system with straight antennas for the top-emitting organic light emitting diodes (TOLEDs) are investigated. Using a high-density plasma on the order of ∼ 10 11 electrons/cm 3 formed by nine straight antennas connected in parallel, a high-density SiN x passivation layer was deposited on a transparent Mg–Ag cathode at a substrate temperature of 40 °C. Even at a low substrate temperature, single SiN x passivation layer prepared by ICP-CVD showed a low water vapor transmission rate of 5 × 10 − 2 g/m 2 /day and a transparency of ∼ 85% respectively. In addition, current–voltage–luminescence results of the TOLED passivated by the SiN x layer indicated that the electrical and optical properties of the TOLED were not affected by the high-density plasma during the SiN x deposition process.