Synthesis of Lead-Free Cs2AgBiX6 (X = Cl, Br, I) Double Perovskite Nanoplatelets and Their Application in CO2 Photocatalytic Reduction

Morphology control represents an important strategy for the development of functional nanomaterials and has yet to be achieved in the case of promising lead-free double perovskite materials so far. In this work, high-quality Cs₂AgBiX₆ (X = Cl, Br, I) two-dimensional nanoplatelets were synthesized through a newly developed synthetic procedure. By analyzing the optical, morphological, and structural evolutions of the samples during synthesis, we elucidated that the growth mechanism of lead-free double perovskite nanoplatelets followed a lateral growth process from mono-octahedral-layer (half-unit-cell in thickness) cluster-based nanosheets to multilayer (three to four unit cells in thickness) nanoplatelets. Furthermore, we demonstrated that Cs₂AgBiBr₆ nanoplatelets possess a better performance in photocatalytic CO₂ reduction compared with their nanocube counterpart. Our work demonstrates the first example with two-dimensional morphology of this important class of lead-free perovskite materials, shedding light on the synthetic manipulation and the application integration of such promising materials.