Sensitive X-ray detectors made of methylammonium lead tribromide perovskite single crystals

Haotong Wei, Yanjun Fang, Padhraic Mulligan, William Chuirazzi, Hong Hua Fang, Congcong Wang, Benjamin R. Ecker, Yongli Gao, Maria Antonietta Loi, Lei Cao, Jinsong Huang

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1383 Scopus citations

Abstract

The large mobilities and carrier lifetimes of hybrid perovskite single crystals and the high atomic numbers of Pb, I and Br make them ideal for X-ray and gamma-ray detection. Here, we report a sensitive X-ray detector made of methylammonium lead bromide perovskite single crystals. A record-high mobility-lifetime product of 1.2 × 10 -2 €...cm 2 €...V -1 and an extremely small surface charge recombination velocity of 64 €...cm €...s -1 are realized by reducing the bulk defects and passivating surface traps. Single-crystal devices with a thickness of 2-3 €...mm show 16.4% detection efficiency at near zero bias under irradiation with continuum X-ray energy up to 50 €...keV. The lowest detectable X-ray dose rate is 0.5 €...μGy air €...s -1 with a sensitivity of 80 €...μC €...Gy 1 air €...cm -2, which is four times higher than the sensitivity achieved with α-Se X-ray detectors. This allows the radiation dose applied to a human body to be reduced for many medical and security check applications.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)333-339
Number of pages7
JournalNature Photonics
Volume10
Issue number5
DOIs
StatePublished - May 1 2016
Externally publishedYes

Funding

The majority of this work was supported financially by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (award no. HDTRA1-14-1-0030). M.A.L. acknowledges funding from the European Research Council (ERC starting grant 'Hy-SPOD' no. 306983). Y.G. acknowledges support from the National Science Foundation (grant no. CBET-1437656).

FundersFunder number
National Science FoundationCBET-1437656
Defense Threat Reduction AgencyHDTRA1-14-1-0030
Engineering Research Centers306983
European Research Council

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