My curiosity in organic-inorganic hybrid perovskite dates to 2015 after I was a Ph.D. pupil engaged on natural nanolaser initiatives. At the moment, hybrid perovskites have been rising candidates for light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and nanolasers due to their excellent optoelectronic properties with outstanding tunability (Nat. Nanotechnol. 9, 687 (2014); Nat. Mater. 13, 476 (2014); Nat. Mater. 14, 636 (2015)). I used to be actually impressed by the event of perovskite-based optoelectronic gadgets within the following years. After I was about to graduate, I spotted that perovskite LEDs have been very promising for commercialization and in addition held nice potential in attaining electrically pushed lasers.
I used to be fortunate sufficient to hitch Prof. Letian Dou’s analysis group at Davidson College of Chemical Engineering, Purdue College as a postdoc. analysis affiliate in 2019 and began to work on perovskite LEDs. Impressed by latest work in our group on natural ligand design for novel two-dimensional (2D) perovskites (Nat. Chem. 11, 1151-1157 (2019)), I made a decision to rationally design and synthesize natural molecules to learn cost injection, improve the soundness, and passivate the defects in perovskite LEDs, all of which finally led to 2 profitable initiatives (Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 60, 8337-8343 (2021); ACS Nano 15, 6316-6325 (2021)). Regardless that the system efficiency I demonstrated in these works isn’t spectacular sufficient, I actually acquired a deeper understanding of the sector afterward. To additional advance the system efficiency when it comes to each exterior quantum effectivity and stability, quasi-2D perovskites got here to my thoughts relating to their superior optoelectronic properties with enhanced environmental stability in comparison with their 3D counterparts. Nevertheless, the efficiency of quasi-2D perovskite LEDs again then is probably going restricted by the formation of a number of quantum wells with uncontrollable section distribution within the movies. This phenomenon was sometimes referred to as “section separation” or extra particularly described as “section disproportionation” by us.
To make a section purer quasi-2D perovskite movie, we have now to reply two associated basic questions. The primary query we confronted was to grasp the origin of this section disproportionation subject. As has been mentioned earlier than (Nat. Commun. 9, 3541 (2018)), section separation is a spontaneous course of for typical quasi-2D perovskites as a result of n = 1 section (Fig. 1a) is enthalpically favored and a combination of n-phases is entropically favored. In different phrases, the formation of a movie with broad section distribution is unavoidable as a result of it’s a thermodynamically favored course of. Contemplating mass transport (kinetic issue) should occur throughout section disproportionation and the ionic characteristic of perovskite supplies, we speculated that the ligands may management the kinetics and thus section purity by modulating the ion diffusion limitations or defect densities by means of which ion diffusion can happen. The subsequent problem was designing novel natural ligands to inhibit ion migration and scale back defect density as a lot as doable. Current works have demonstrated that conjugated ligands (e.g., TEA) can inhibit ion diffusion inside and between 2D perovskite heterostructures (Nature 580, 614-620 (2020); Nat. Nanotechnol. 16, 584-591 (2021)). To higher suppress ion diffusion, we innovatively designed and synthesized two new natural conjugated ligands, PPT’ and PPT. The design of those ligands was motivated by their comparatively massive π-systems, which is already a longtime issue for suppressing ion diffusion, and their distinct cross-sections as a result of elevated steric barrier. This latter issue could result in higher resolution processability and weird section management behaviors, which is but to be explored.
Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have been carried out to check the free vitality barrier of interlayer I– diffusion in perovskites primarily based on completely different ligands, which give means to make clear the ligand results on section distribution management. By conducting a collection of skinny movie research mixed with in-situ characterizations, we discovered that bulkier ligands can higher suppress ionic transport, thus enabling perovskite skinny movies with narrowed section distributions (i.e., greater section purity), decreased defect densities, and enhanced radiative recombination efficiencies (Fig. 1b, c). Consequently, we’re in a position to obtain environment friendly and steady deep-red light-emitting diodes with a peak exterior quantum effectivity of 26.3% (common 22.9% amongst 70 gadgets and crosschecked). To the very best of our information, that is the very best effectivity reported up to now for a quasi-2D halide perovskite LED within the crimson area. Our gadgets additionally exhibit huge wavelength tunability and improved spectral and section stability in contrast with present quasi-2D perovskite light-emitting diodes.
Fig. 1| a, The schematic illustration for the overall construction of quasi-2D perovskites and the chemical constructions of enormous natural ligands, BA, TEA, PPT’, and PPT, studied on this work. b,c, BA and TEA (b); PPT’ and PPT (c) primarily based crystallization schemes summarized from a collection of characterizations.
Our work offers vital insights into the molecular design and crystallization kinetics of low-dimensional perovskite semiconductors for light-emitting gadgets. We imagine this molecular engineering technique may very well be expanded to different perovskite-based optoelectronic gadgets. This work additionally suggests that there’s a shiny future in remodeling perovskite LED expertise into real-world purposes.
Learn our paper in Nature Communications: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-36118-7.