Scientists have developed a surprising new way to power materials that normally cannot conduct electricity, opening the door to a new generation of ultra pure near infrared LEDs for medical imaging, communications technology, and advanced sensors.
The breakthrough relies on tiny “molecular antennas” that funnel electrical energy into insulating nanoparticles. By using this method, researchers at the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge created the first LEDs ever built from these previously “unpowerable” materials.
Their findings were published in Nature.
Molecular Antennas Power Insulating Nanoparticles
The research centers on lanthanide doped nanoparticles (LnNPs), materials known for producing exceptionally stable and highly pure light. They are especially valuable because they emit light in the second near infrared region, which can travel deep into biological tissue. This makes them attractive for medical imaging and sensing technologies.
Despite their optical advantages, these nanoparticles have one major drawback. They are electrical insulators, meaning they cannot easily carry electric current. That limitation has prevented scientists from using them in electronic devices such as LEDs.
Researchers at Cambridge found a way around that obstacle, a feat previously thought impossible under normal conditions. By attaching specially selected organic molecules to the nanoparticles, the team created a system capable of transferring electrical energy into the insulating material.
“These nanoparticles are fantastic light emitters, but we couldn’t power them with electricity. It was a major barrier preventing their use in everyday technology,” said Professor Akshay Rao, who led the research at the Cavendish Laboratory. “We’ve essentially found a back door to power them. The organic molecules act like antennas, catching charge carriers and then ‘whispering’ it to the nanoparticle through a special triplet energy transfer process, which is surprisingly efficient.”
Organic Hybrid LEDs Achieve Over 98% Energy Transfer
To make the technology work, the scientists built a hybrid material that combines organic molecules with inorganic nanoparticles. They attached an organic dye called 9-anthracenecarboxylic acid (9-ACA) to the surface of the LnNPs.
Inside the newly designed LEDs, electrical charges are directed into the 9-ACA molecules instead of the nanoparticles themselves. These molecules act as molecular antennas that absorb the incoming energy and enter an excited “triplet state.”
In many optical systems, triplet states are considered “dark” because their energy is often lost. In this new design, however, the triplet energy is transferred to the lanthanide ions inside the nanoparticles with more than 98% efficiency. That process causes the insulating nanoparticles to emit bright, highly pure light.
Ultra Pure Near Infrared LEDs With Low Power Use
The resulting devices, called “LnLEDs,” operate at a relatively low voltage of about 5 volts. They also produce electroluminescence with an extremely narrow spectral width, giving them much purer light output than competing technologies such as quantum dots (QDs).
“The purity of the light in the second near-infrared window emitted by our LnLEDs is a huge advantage,” said Dr. Zhongzheng Yu, a lead author of the study and postdoctoral research associate at the Cavendish Laboratory. “For applications like biomedical sensing or optical communications, you want a very sharp, specific wavelength. Our devices achieve this effortlessly, something that is very difficult to do with other materials.”
Medical Imaging and Optical Communication Potential
The technology could lead to a wide range of future applications. Because the LEDs emit extremely pure near infrared light, they may enable new medical devices capable of seeing deep inside the body.
Tiny injectable or wearable LnLEDs could potentially help doctors detect cancers, monitor organs in real time, or activate light sensitive drugs with exceptional precision.
The narrow and stable light emission could also improve optical communications systems by reducing interference and allowing larger amounts of data to travel more clearly and efficiently. In addition, the technology may support highly sensitive detectors capable of identifying specific chemicals or biological markers.
First Generation Devices Already Show Strong Results
The research team has already achieved a peak external quantum efficiency greater than 0.6% for their NIR-II LEDs, an impressive result for an early generation device. The scientists also say there are clear paths for improving performance even further.
“This is just the beginning. We’ve unlocked a whole new class of materials for optoelectronics,” added Dr. Yunzhou Deng, postdoctoral research associate at the Cavendish Laboratory. “The fundamental principle is so versatile that we can now explore countless combinations of organic molecules and insulating nanomaterials. This will allow us to create devices with tailored properties for applications we haven’t even thought of yet.”
The work received support in part from a UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Frontier Research Grant (EP/Y015584/1) and Postdoctoral Individual Fellowships (Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship grant scheme).