In-Situ Formed Type I Nanocrystalline Perovskite Film for Highly Efficient Light-Emitting Diode

Excellent color purity with a tunable band gap renders organic–inorganic halide perovskite highly capable of performing as light-emitting diodes (LEDs). Perovskite nanocrystals show a photoluminescence quantum yield exceeding 90%, which, however, decreases to lower than 20% upon formation of a thin film. The limited photoluminescence quantum yield of a perovskite thin film has been a formidable obstacle for development of highly efficient perovskite LEDs. Here, we report a method for highly luminescent MAPbBr₃ (MA = CH₃NH₃) nanocrystals formed in situ in a thin film based on nonstoichiometric adduct and solvent-vacuum drying approaches. Excess MABr with respect to PbBr₂ in precursor solution plays a critical role in inhibiting crystal growth of MAPbBr₃, thereby forming nanocrystals and creating type I band alignment with core MAPbBr₃ by embedding MAPbBr₃ nanocrystals in the unreacted wider band gap MABr. A solvent-vacuum drying process was developed to preserve nanocrystals in the film, which realizes a fast photoluminescence lifetime of 3.9 ns along with negligible trapping processes. Based on a highly luminescent nanocrystalline MAPbBr₃ thin film, a highly efficient green LED with a maximum external quantum efficiency of 8.21% and a current efficiency of 34.46 cd/A was demonstrated.