In situ investigation of light soaking in organolead halide perovskite films

Organolead halide perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have generated extensive attention recently with power conversion efficiency (PCE) exceeding 23%. However, these PSCs exhibit photoinduced instability in the course of their current-voltage measurements. In this work, we study the light-induced behavior in CH3NH3PbI3−xClx films in situ, by employing wide-field photoluminescence (PL) microscopy to obtain both the spatially and temporally resolved PL images simultaneously. Along with the increase in the PL intensity under continuous illumination, some areas render PL inactive. By characterizing the excitation energy dependent long-time PL decay behavior, we suggest that the PL quenching can be ascribed to a localized accumulation of iodide ions driven by the optical field. This ion localization leads to an enhancement of non-radiative recombination. The appearance of the PL inactive areas in the perovskite film impedes its photovoltaic device performance approaching the theoretical maximum PCE. Therefore, the herein presented real-time investigation of the light soaking of perovskite films is a versatile and adaptable method providing more details to improve the performance of PSCs.