Nanoscale mapping of chemical composition in organic-inorganic hybrid perovskite films

Lead-based organic-inorganic hybrid perovskite (OIHP) solar cells can attain efficiencies over 20%. However, the impact of ion mobility and/or organic depletion, structural changes, and segregation under operating conditions urge for decisive and more accurate investigations. Hence, the development of analytical tools for accessing the grain-to-grain OIHP chemistry is of great relevance. Here, we used synchrotron infrared nanospectroscopy (nano-FTIR) to map individual nanograins in OIHP films. Our results reveal a spatial heterogeneity of the vibrational activity associated to the nanoscale chemical diversity of isolated grains. It was possible to map the chemistry of individual grains in CsFAMA [Cs(0.05)FA(0.79)MA(0.16)Pb(I(0.83)Br(0.17))(3)] and FAMA [FA(0.83)MA(0.17)Pb(I(0.83)Br(0.17))(3)] films, with information on their local composition. Nanograins with stronger nano-FTIR activity in CsFAMA and FAMA films can be assigned to PbI(2) and hexagonal polytype phases, respectively. The analysis herein can be extended to any OIHP films where organic cation depletion/accumulation can be used as a chemical label to study composition.