Spatially Resolved Analysis of Defect Annihilation and Recovery Dynamics in Metal Halide Perovskite Single Crystals

The spectacular advances in efficiency of optoelectronic devices based on lead–halide perovskites have been accompanied by detailed structural and optical studies regarding the instability presented by these materials, which constitute their main bottleneck for commercialization. Following a pump and probe scheme in a laser scanning confocal microscope, we resolve the photoinduced emission activation/deactivation dynamics in CH3NH3PbBr3 single crystals with millisecond and sub-micrometer resolution. This is complemented with a study of spectral variations and interpreted in the framework of light-induced ion migration and associated defect passivation. Our results point to the presence of photoinduced structural changes accompanying the migration of ions.