Water-Induced and Wavelength-Dependent Light Absorption and Emission Dynamics in Triple-Cation Halide Perovskites

Metal halide perovskites (MHP) can be made more stable through the addition of small amounts of cesium. Despite the improvement, these multication absorbers still display strong environmental sensitivity to any combination of factors, including water, oxygen, bias, temperature, and light. Here, the relationship is elucidated between light absorption, charge carrier radiative recombination, and relative humidity (rH) for the Cs0.05FA0.79MA0.16Pb(I0.83Br0.17)3 composition, revealing partially reversible reductions in the extinction coefficient and fully reversible 25× enhancements in absolute light emission registered across the same humidity cycles up to 70% rH. With in situ excitation wavelength-dependent measurements, irreversible changes are identified in the perovskite after a single cycle of humidity-dependent photoluminescence (PL) performed with 450 nm excitation. The in situ measurement platform can be extended to test the effect of other stressors on thin films’ optical behavior.