Color-Selective Organic Photomultiplication Photodetectors for Filter-Free Full-Color Imaging

Abstract Photodetectors with intrinsic wavelength selectivity could eliminate color filters in imaging systems, but narrowband organic absorbers often exhibit limited efficiency. Here, we report a vacuum-processed organic photodetector that includes color selectivity with carrier amplification. The device combines a narrowband organic absorber with a diluted TAPC:C60 photomultiplication layer, where isolated C60 sites trap electrons, induce interfacial band bending, and promote hole-tunneling injection. This architecture delivers an external quantum efficiency (EQE) of 2394%, a specific detectivity of 3.04 × 1012 Jones, a linear dynamic range of 127 dB, and microsecond response. Replacing only the absorber produces blue-, green-, and red-selective photodetectors with peak EQE of 350, 570, and 783%, respectively. The resulting photodetectors enable full-color image reconstruction with an average color difference of 1.75 relative to the silicon system using a standard 24-color calibration target. Our results provide a versatile route to high-gain color-selective photodetectors for filter-free colorful imaging.