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Toso S, Baranov D, Altamura D, Scattarella F, Dahl J, Wang X, Marras S, Alivisatos AP, Singer A, Giannini C, Manna L. Multilayer Diffraction Reveals That Colloidal Superlattices Approach the Structural Perfection of Single Crystals. ACS NANO 2021; 15:6243-6256. [PMID: 33481560 PMCID: PMC8155329 DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.0c08929] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/26/2020] [Accepted: 01/13/2021] [Indexed: 05/06/2023]
Abstract
Colloidal superlattices are fascinating materials made of ordered nanocrystals, yet they are rarely called "atomically precise". That is unsurprising, given how challenging it is to quantify the degree of structural order in these materials. However, once that order crosses a certain threshold, the constructive interference of X-rays diffracted by the nanocrystals dominates the diffraction pattern, offering a wealth of structural information. By treating nanocrystals as scattering sources forming a self-probing interferometer, we developed a multilayer diffraction method that enabled the accurate determination of the nanocrystal size, interparticle spacing, and their fluctuations for samples of self-assembled CsPbBr3 and PbS nanomaterials. The multilayer diffraction method requires only a laboratory-grade diffractometer and an open-source fitting algorithm for data analysis. The average nanocrystal displacement of 0.33 to 1.43 Å in the studied superlattices provides a figure of merit for their structural perfection and approaches the atomic displacement parameters found in traditional crystals.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stefano Toso
- Nanochemistry
Department, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova, Italy
- International
Doctoral Program in Science, Università
Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, 25121 Brescia, Italy
| | - Dmitry Baranov
- Nanochemistry
Department, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova, Italy
| | - Davide Altamura
- Istituto
di Cristallografia - Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (IC−CNR), Via Amendola 122/O, I-70126 Bari, Italy
| | - Francesco Scattarella
- Istituto
di Cristallografia - Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (IC−CNR), Via Amendola 122/O, I-70126 Bari, Italy
| | - Jakob Dahl
- Department
of Chemistry, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Materials
Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National
Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
| | - Xingzhi Wang
- Department
of Chemistry, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Materials
Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National
Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
| | - Sergio Marras
- Materials
Characterization Facility, Istituto Italiano
di Tecnologia, Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova, Italy
| | - A. Paul Alivisatos
- Department
of Chemistry, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Materials
Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National
Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Department
of Materials Science and Engineering, University
of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Kavli
Energy NanoScience Institute, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
| | - Andrej Singer
- Department
of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell
University, Ithaca, New York 14850, United States
| | - Cinzia Giannini
- Istituto
di Cristallografia - Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (IC−CNR), Via Amendola 122/O, I-70126 Bari, Italy
| | - Liberato Manna
- Nanochemistry
Department, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova, Italy
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Toso S, Baranov D, Altamura D, Scattarella F, Dahl J, Wang X, Marras S, Alivisatos AP, Singer A, Giannini C, Manna L. Multilayer Diffraction Reveals That Colloidal Superlattices Approach the Structural Perfection of Single Crystals. ACS NANO 2021; 15:6243-6256. [PMID: 33481560 DOI: 10.26434/chemrxiv.13103507.v1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/22/2023]
Abstract
Colloidal superlattices are fascinating materials made of ordered nanocrystals, yet they are rarely called "atomically precise". That is unsurprising, given how challenging it is to quantify the degree of structural order in these materials. However, once that order crosses a certain threshold, the constructive interference of X-rays diffracted by the nanocrystals dominates the diffraction pattern, offering a wealth of structural information. By treating nanocrystals as scattering sources forming a self-probing interferometer, we developed a multilayer diffraction method that enabled the accurate determination of the nanocrystal size, interparticle spacing, and their fluctuations for samples of self-assembled CsPbBr3 and PbS nanomaterials. The multilayer diffraction method requires only a laboratory-grade diffractometer and an open-source fitting algorithm for data analysis. The average nanocrystal displacement of 0.33 to 1.43 Å in the studied superlattices provides a figure of merit for their structural perfection and approaches the atomic displacement parameters found in traditional crystals.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stefano Toso
- Nanochemistry Department, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova, Italy
- International Doctoral Program in Science, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, 25121 Brescia, Italy
| | - Dmitry Baranov
- Nanochemistry Department, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova, Italy
| | - Davide Altamura
- Istituto di Cristallografia - Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (IC-CNR), Via Amendola 122/O, I-70126 Bari, Italy
| | - Francesco Scattarella
- Istituto di Cristallografia - Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (IC-CNR), Via Amendola 122/O, I-70126 Bari, Italy
| | - Jakob Dahl
- Department of Chemistry, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Materials Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
| | - Xingzhi Wang
- Department of Chemistry, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Materials Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
| | - Sergio Marras
- Materials Characterization Facility, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova, Italy
| | - A Paul Alivisatos
- Department of Chemistry, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Materials Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Kavli Energy NanoScience Institute, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
| | - Andrej Singer
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14850, United States
| | - Cinzia Giannini
- Istituto di Cristallografia - Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (IC-CNR), Via Amendola 122/O, I-70126 Bari, Italy
| | - Liberato Manna
- Nanochemistry Department, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Via Morego 30, 16163 Genova, Italy
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Khabibullin AR, Efros AL, Erwin SC. The role of ligands in electron transport in nanocrystal solids. NANOSCALE 2020; 12:23028-23035. [PMID: 33200157 DOI: 10.1039/d0nr06892f] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/11/2023]
Abstract
We investigate theoretically the transport of electrons and holes in crystalline solids consisting of three-dimensional arrays of semiconductor nanocrystals passivated by two types of organic ligands-linear chain carboxylates and functionalized aromatic cinnamates. We focus on a critical quantity in transport: the quantum-mechanical overlap of the strongly confined electron and hole wavefunctions on neighboring nanocrystals. Using results from density-functional-theory (DFT) calculations, we construct a one-dimensional model system whose analytic wavefunctions reproduce the full DFT numerical overlap values. By investigating the analytic behavior of this model, we reveal several important features of electron transport. The most significant is that the wavefunction overlap decays exponentially with ligand length, with a characteristic decay length that depends primarily on properties of the ligand and is almost independent of the size and type of nanocrystal. Functionalization of the ligands can also affect the overlap by changing the height of the tunneling barrier. The physically transparent analytic expressions we obtain for the wavefunction overlap and its decay length should be useful for future efforts to control transport in nanocrystal solids.
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Affiliation(s)
- Artem R Khabibullin
- NRC Research Associate, Resident at Center for Computational Materials Science, Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC 20375, USA
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