Epitaxial Metal Halide Perovskites by Inkjet-Printing on Various Substrates

Abstract

Metal-halide-perovskites revolutionized the field of thin-film semiconductor technology, due to their favorable optoelectronic properties and facile solution processing. Further improvements of perovskite thin-film devices require structural coherence on the atomic scale. Such perfection is achieved by epitaxial growth, a method that is based on the use of high-end deposition chambers. Here epitaxial growth is enabled via a ≈1000 times cheaper device, a single nozzle inkjet printer. By printing, single-crystal micro- and nanostructure arrays and crystalline coherent thin films are obtained on selected substrates. The hetero-epitaxial structures of methylammonium PbBr3 grown on lattice matching substrates exhibit similar luminescence as bulk single crystals, but the crystals phase transitions are shifted to lower temperatures, indicating a structural stabilization due to interfacial lattice anchoring by the substrates. Thus, the inkjet-printing of metal-halide perovskites provides improved material characteristics in a highly economical way, as a future cheap competitor to the high-end semiconductor growth technologies.