Synthesis and Characterization of Bandgap-modulated Organic Lead Halide Single Crystals

Abstract

Single crystal of organic lead halide (CH3NH3PbX3; CH3NH3+ = methylammonium (MA), X = Cl−, Br−, I−) is the best candidate for material intrinsic property studies due to no grain boundary and high crystal quality than the film having a lot of grain boundary and surface defects. The representative crystallization methods are inverse temperature crystallization (ITC) and anti-solvent vapor assisted crystallization (AVC). Herein, we report bandgap modulated organic lead halide single crystals having a bandgap ranging from ~ 2.1 eV to ~ 3 eV with ITC and AVC methods. The bandgap modulation was achieved by controlling the solvents and chloride-to-bromide ratio. Structural, optical and compositional properties of prepared crystals were characterized. The results show that the crystals synthesized by the two crystallization methods have similar properties, but the halide ratios in the crystals synthesized by the AVC method are controlled more quantitatively than the crystals synthesized by ITC.