Enhancing LED spectral output with perylene dye-based remote phosphor

LEDs offer a wide range of spectral output with high efficiencies. However, the efficiencies of solid-state LEDs with green and yellow wavelengths are rather low due to the lack of suitable direct bandgap materials. Here, we introduce and develop perylene-enhanced green LEDs that produce a higher wall-plug efficiency of 48% compared to 38% for a solid-state green LED. While the wall-plug efficiency of the perylene-enhanced red LED is still lower than that of a solid-state red LED, we demonstrate that remote phosphor colour converters are effective solutions for targeted spectral tuning across the visible spectrum for horticultural lighting. In this work, we retrofit existing white LEDs and augment photosynthesis via spectral output tuning to achieve a higher red-to-blue ratio. Our results show a significant improvement in plant growth by up to 39%, after a 4-month growth cycle. We observe no visible degradation of the colour converter even under continuous illumination with a current of 400 mA. This opens up new opportunities for using perylene-based colour converters for tuneable illumination with high brightness.