Pressure driven rotational isomerism in 2D hybrid perovskites

Tingting Yin; Hejin Yan; Ibrahim Abdelwahab; Yulia Lekina; Xujie Lü; Wenge Yang; Handong Sun; Kai Leng; Yongqing Cai; Ze Xiang Shen; Kian Ping Loh

doi:10.1038/s41467-023-36032-y

Pressure driven rotational isomerism in 2D hybrid perovskites

Nat Commun. 2023 Jan 25;14(1):411. doi: 10.1038/s41467-023-36032-y.

Authors

Tingting Yin^#¹, Hejin Yan^#², Ibrahim Abdelwahab³, Yulia Lekina^{4

5}, Xujie Lü⁶, Wenge Yang⁶, Handong Sun⁴, Kai Leng⁷, Yongqing Cai⁸, Ze Xiang Shen^{9

10}, Kian Ping Loh^{11

12}

Affiliations

¹ Division of Physics and Applied Physics, School of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, 637371, Singapore. TTYIN@ntu.edu.sg.
² Joint Key Laboratory of Ministry of Education Institute of Applied Physics and Materials Engineering, University of Macau, Macau, China.
³ Department of Chemistry, National University of Singapore, Singapore, 117543, Singapore.
⁴ Division of Physics and Applied Physics, School of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, 637371, Singapore.
⁵ Centre for Disruptive Photonic Technologies, the Photonics Institute, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, 637371, Singapore.
⁶ Center for High Pressure Science and Technology Advanced Research, (HPSTAR), Shanghai, 201203, P.R. China.
⁷ Department of Applied Physics, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China.
⁸ Joint Key Laboratory of Ministry of Education Institute of Applied Physics and Materials Engineering, University of Macau, Macau, China. yongqingcai@um.edu.mo.
⁹ Division of Physics and Applied Physics, School of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, 637371, Singapore. zexiang@ntu.edu.sg.
¹⁰ Centre for Disruptive Photonic Technologies, the Photonics Institute, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, 637371, Singapore. zexiang@ntu.edu.sg.
¹¹ Department of Chemistry, National University of Singapore, Singapore, 117543, Singapore. chmlohkp@nus.edu.sg.
¹² Department of Applied Physics, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China. chmlohkp@nus.edu.sg.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Multilayers consisting of alternating soft and hard layers offer enhanced toughness compared to all-hard structures. However, shear instability usually exists in physically sputtered multilayers because of deformation incompatibility among hard and soft layers. Here, we demonstrate that 2D hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites (HOIP) provide an interesting platform to study the stress-strain behavior of hard and soft layers undulating with molecular scale periodicity. We investigate the phonon vibrations and photoluminescence properties of Ruddlesden-Popper perovskites (RPPs) under compression using a diamond anvil cell. The organic spacer due to C4 alkyl chain in RPP buffers compressive stress by tilting (n = 1 RPP) or step-wise rotational isomerism (n = 2 RPP) during compression, where n is the number of inorganic layers. By examining the pressure threshold of the elastic recovery regime across n = 1-4 RPPs, we obtained molecular insights into the relationship between structure and deformation resistance in hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites.