Disorder-induced bulk photovoltaic effect in a centrosymmetric van der Waals material

Sunlight is widely seen as one of the most abundant forms of renewable energy, with photovoltaic cells based on pn junctions being the most commonly used platform attempting to harness it. Unlike in conventional photovoltaic cells, the bulk photovoltaic effect (BPVE) allows for the generation of photocurrent and photovoltage in a single material without the need to engineer a pn junction and create a built-in electric field, thus offering a solution that can potentially exceed the Shockley–Queisser efficiency limit. However, it requires a material with no inversion symmetry and is therefore absent in centrosymmetric materials. Here, we demonstrate that breaking the inversion symmetry by structural disorder can induce BPVE in ultrathin PtSe2, a centrosymmetric semiconducting van der Waals material. Homogenous illumination of defective PtSe2 by linearly and circularly polarized light results in a photoresponse termed as linear photogalvanic effect (LPGE) and circular photogalvanic effect (CPGE), which is mostly absent in the pristine crystal. First-principles calculations reveal that LPGE originates from Se vacancies that act as asymmetric scattering centers for the photo-generated electron-hole pairs. Our work emphasizes the importance of defects to induce photovoltaic functionality in centrosymmetric materials and shows how the range of materials suitable for light sensing and energy-harvesting applications can be extended.