Abstract

Organic electronic devices are often multi-component, heterogeneous systems ranging from relatively well defined bilayers to thin film blends laterally phase-separated at multiple length scales. Complete understanding of device structures and morphology and the correlation to device performance often requires sophisticated cauterization methods. Near Edge X-ray Absorption Fine Structure (NEXAFS) microscopy and resonant soft x-ray reflectivity (RSoXR) are techniques that offer high intrinsic contrast to image materials in real space or characterize structure in reciprocal space with _{30 nm spatial resolution and a q-range of} 2 nm-1, respectively. Furthermore, the high contrast is strongly photon energy dependent and correlated to the chemical moieties present in the sample, thus allowing compositionally sensitive characterization. I will present the present state of the art of these characterization tools with a focus on the most recent applications to organic electronic devices. This includes the development of Soft X-ray Beam Induced Current (SoXBIC) measurements that will allow to directly correlate local efficiency in organic bulk-heterojunction solar cell to the local composition and the use of RSoXR to characterize interfacial properties in multilayered OLE Ds for which conventional reflectivity has no sensitivity. The use of these soft x-ray methods for organic devices has only recently been initiated by McNeill et al. and their full potential to device characterization has yet to be explored.