Rice University Scientists Create Near-Perfect 2D Perovskite Crystal That Boosts Energy Transport

Researchers at Rice University and collaborating institutions have engineered a new type of two-dimensional semiconductor that achieves near-perfect crystal symmetry, enabling energy to move through the material without getting trapped. The findings, published in Nature Synthesis, could have implications for solar cells and other optoelectronic devices.

Overcoming distortion

The new semiconductor belongs to a class of materials known as 2D metal halide perovskites, which consist of both organic and inorganic components. While semiconductors made from inorganic materials tend to form highly ordered, symmetrical crystal structures, perovskites have softer lattices that are more prone to distortions, which can limit performance.

A team led by Aditya Mohite engineered a multilayered 2D perovskite that exhibits no such distortions.

“It is as close to perfectly symmetrical as you can find in a crystal, and, to the best of our knowledge, it is the first time this has been demonstrated in a multilayered 2D perovskite system at room temperature,” Mohite explained. He is Rice’s William M. Rice Trustee Professor and a Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.

“All the light that gets absorbed forms these material excitations called excitons, which can then propagate through the material for more than two micrometres without losing energy. That’s a big deal, because not many materials can really do this,” Mohite added.

An order of magnitude improvement

In terms of exciton transport, the new 2D perovskite performs an order of magnitude better than previously reported perovskites. Its performance is on par with monolayer transition metal dichalcogenides, a newer generation of 2D materials used in applications including ultrasensitive sensors and integrated electronic circuits.

The material achieved an exciton diffusion length of 2.5 micrometres and a diffusivity of 4.4 cm2 per second.

A different manufacturing approach

The advance relied in part on a different way of producing the material. Instead of allowing crystals to form as a solution cools, the researchers removed them at higher temperatures, locking in the desired structure before it could transform.

Earlier efforts had been limited to thinner versions of these materials, but the new approach enabled thicker, multilayered forms.

Isaac Metcalf, a Rice PhD alum and Postdoctoral Researcher in the Mohite research group, is a co-first author on the study. He described the structural achievement.

“In two directions, it looks like a perovskite, and in the third direction, three perovskite layers are connected together,” Metcalf explained. “Before, people had only been able to connect two perovskite layers using this chemically stable formamidinium cation inside those layers. This is the first time that someone has connected three or more layers in this configuration.”

Why thickness matters

The added thickness changes how the material interacts with light. As more layers are stacked, the energy threshold needed to absorb light – known as the band gap – becomes smaller, allowing the material to capture a broader portion of the solar spectrum.

“The more sunlight it can absorb, the better a solar cell it can be, which is why people are excited about this,” Metcalf noted.

Proof-of-concept devices

The material was tested in proof-of-concept self-powered photodetectors – devices that convert light into electrical signals. Devices made from the new perovskite were more sensitive and responded faster than those made from a different 2D perovskite, particularly in thicker films.

Implications for tandem solar cells

The findings could also have implications for tandem solar cells, where two or more materials are layered to capture different parts of the light spectrum more efficiently.

Faiz Mandani, a Rice PhD alum and study Co-Author, pointed to one of the current challenges in that field.

“One of the big challenges with tandems right now is the wide band gap material,” Mandani remarked. “The 2D perovskites we are developing have enhanced stability. And this specific 2D perovskite has a near ideal band gap to pair with silicon or any other perovskite or semiconductor.”

Research team

Jin Hou, a Materials Science and Nanoengineering PhD student at Rice, was the first author on the study along with Jared Fletcher, a Graduate Student at Northwestern University working in the research group of Mercouri Kanatzidis, a co-corresponding author alongside Mohite.

In addition to Rice and Northwestern, collaborators include researchers at City University of New York, University of Rennes, University of Lille and University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

The research was supported by the US National Science Foundation, the China Scholarship Council, the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, the French National Research Agency, the American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund, France’s National Centre for Scientific Research and the Academic Institute of France.

Last Updated on April 8, 2026 by Nick Ross