Scalable Fabrication of Low-Cost, High-Stability Copper(I) Halide Hybrid Scintillator for High-Performance Flexible X-Ray Imaging

Abstract

Traditional inorganic single-crystal scintillators face several adverse conditions, such as high cost, complex process and poor flexibility. To avoid these shortcomings, in this work, the low-cost benzyl bromide is used to efficiently synthesize the 0D organic-inorganic hybrid copper(I) halide compound Cu₅I₄Br₃(bz-ted)₂ (Compound Y) by the room-temperature solution method. The yields of the ligand (95%) and the scintillator (97%) are nearly 100%, and a single-batch production of 10.29 g is achieved, while the cost of the ligand raw material is drastically reduced. This material has an “all-in-one” (AIO) structure, with intramolecular π···π stacking interaction and Cu···Cu cuprophilic interactions together enhancing structural rigidity, resulting in its remarkable thermal, air, and light stability. Notably, Compound Y exhibits excellent yellow light-emitting properties with an outstanding photoluminescent quantum yield (PLQY = 90.66%) and an ultrahigh external quantum efficiency (EQY = 81.59%), which is investigated to be the emission from the self-trapped excitons (STEs). Moreover, it has favorable scintillation properties, with a low detection limit of 2.426 μGy_air·s⁻¹ and a satisfactory spatial resolution of 17.7 lp·mm⁻¹. When blended with styrene-ethylene-butene-styrene (SEBS) to fabricate the flexible scintillation screen, it can withstand 200% stretching and 0°–90° bending, with no halo distortion in imaging. This work not only promotes the commercial application of AIO-structured materials, but also provides a new approach for the large-scale fabrication of low-cost and high-performance flexible X-ray scintillators.