<p>Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) are a lighting technology with a
huge and ascending market. Typically, LED backlights are often paired with inorganic
phosphors made from rare-earth elements (REEs) to tune the emission lineshapes for
different applications. However, REE production is a resource-intensive process
with many negative environmental impacts. Herein we develop organic hybrid LEDs
using organic dyes synthesized from an abundant and non-toxic natural product
(theobromine) to replace REE phosphors. The resulting hybrid LED generates
continuous emission from 400 – 740 nm, resulting in high color rendering index
(the current industry standard) of 90 and color fidelity index (the most
advanced and comprehensive standard) of 92, challenging commercial LEDs based
on REE phosphors. In addition, the light-converting composite is made from 99
wt% SBS, an inexpensive industrial polymer, and 1wt% theobromine dyes, reducing
the cost of the light converter to ¢1.30 for a 1 W LED, compared to
approximately ¢ 19.2 of commercial products. The light converting efficiency of
the dye-SBS composite is 82%. Excited state kinetics experiments were also conducted
to provide guidance to further increase the light-converting efficiency of the
theobromine dyes while maintaining excellent color rendering and fidelity. </p>