Scientific Achievement
A team of Foundry researchers created a new perovskite nanocrystal system and directly imaged the movement of an exciton that hopped from crystal to crystal over very long distances.
Significance and Impact
For the first time, exciton movement of this distance was directly imaged and shown to be an order of magnitude longer than previous achievements. This work paves the way for commercial application in optoelectronic devices.
Research Details
- The researchers developed a method to create close-packed, self-assembled monolayers of perovskite nanocrystals with long range order by coating a silicon surface with a polymer.
- Using a custom-built microscope, the team directly visualized and measured the excitons hopping across the sample, with nanoscale resolution.
- The new nanocrystal system allows an exciton to hop from one nanocrystal to another across very long distances, with a record diffusion length of 200 nanometers. The longer distance an exciton can move, the more energy can be transported, leading to more efficient devices.
