Atomic-Scale Insights into the Dynamics of Growth and Degradation of All-Inorganic Perovskite Nanocrystals

An understanding of growth and degradation pathways is significant to solve the problem of the structural instability of all-inorganic perovskite nanocrystals (NCs). However, it is still a great challenge to directly record such dynamic processes with high spatial resolution owing to the existence of complex internal factors even using in situ transmission electron microscopy observation. Here, we employ a glassy matrix to produce CsPbBr3 NCs to ensure that the growth and degradation processes of CsPbBr3 NCs are recorded in the vacuum chamber, which could avoid the influence of the external factors, under electron beam (E-beam) irradiation. In addition, two stages of degradation pathways induced by the E-beam are observed sequentially: (1) a layer-by-layer decomposition and (2) instantaneous vanishing once the radius reaches the critical radius (∼2.3 nm). Indeed, we demonstrated that defects serve as a key flash point that could trigger the structural collapse of CsPbBr3 NCs. Our findings provide critical insights into the general instability issue of all-inorganic perovskite NCs in practical applications.