Distribution of radiation from organic light-emitting diode structures with wavelength-scale gratings as a function of azimuth and polar angles

The angular distribution of radiation emitted from organic electroluminescent diodes fabricated on substrates with wavelength-scale gratings was measured using an optical Fourier transform instrument. A simple geometrical model is derived that specifies the polar angle of the exiting photon as a function of the azimuth angle, the grating pitch, the wavelength of light, and the effective index of the refraction of the light emitted by the fluorescing excitons. The radiation pattern of the extracted light is shown to fit that predicted by the model if one assumes that it comes from surface plasmon polaritons and bound TE waveguide modes. (c) 2008 Optical Society of America.