Robustly stable perovskite-based triboelectric nanogenerators via grain-boundary manipulation for light-assisted energy harvesting and wireless control of smart windows

The flexible perovskite-based triboelectric nanogenerators (P-TENGs) exhibit tremendous potential in sensing component and energy harvesting application. Herein, an air-processed FAMAPbI 3 is introduced as the positive triboelectric layer, and polysulfone (PSU)-regulated grain boundary strategy is firstly proposed to improve the output performance and stability in practice. The PSU with distinct polarity can anchor to grain boundaries via the coordination interaction, optimizing the energy level alignment, increasing dielectric constant and passivating defects. The resultant devices exhibit an output current of 20.0 μA and an output voltage of 285 V through optoelectronic and triboelectric coupling effects, and their mean optical responsivity value is 14.26 μA/W. More importantly, the PSU can not only decrease the environmental susceptibility of perovskite but also release the mechanical stress when perovskite under work. The devices showed overall improved stabilities with wide-ranging humidity conditions (30–60 % RH), accelerated aging at 85 °C, 2000 bending cycles, and 10000 mechanical impacts cycles. In applications, a wearable self-powered photodetector has been developed for wireless control systems, which can modulate the states of smart windows according the light intensity. Our work paves the new way for co-energy harvests and self-powered wireless control of electronic devices. • Polysulfone-mediated grain boundary manipulation optimizes crystallization kinetics and suppresses defects. • Multifunctional polymer enables enhanced light-assisted energy harvesting. • Hydrophobic barriers and mechanical toughening synergistically enhance stability. • The wearable perovskite-based TENGs can wirelessly control the smart windows.