from the conferences organized by TANGER Ltd.
Organometal lead halide perovskite is relatively new material, which has proved to be a promising material for construction of solar cells for photovoltaic technology. However, little is known about the toxicity of perovskite nanomaterials. Therefore, we performed several experiments to evaluate potential ecotoxicity of perovskites on soil bacteria Pseudomonas putida. Three types of perovskites were tested (CH3NH3PbI3, CHNHNH3PbBr3, CH3NH3PbBr3), each of them containing toxic lead, which leaked from the material. Therefore we determined the concentration of leaked lead using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). The effect of perovskites and lead on bacterial metabolism and viability was evaluated using respirometry and fluorescence analysis. Three concentrations of perovskites were tested – 50, 100 and 500 mg/L and four concentrations of lead in form of Pb(NO3)2 (100, 200, 500 and 1000 mg/L) in diluted Soya nutrient broth medium. The bacterial respiration was negatively affected by 500 and 1000 mg/L of lead; however it was not affected when similar concentration that leaked from the perovskite (100 mg/L and 200 mg/L) was added. Moreover, none of the three perovskite materials caused significant toxic effect towards bacteria.
Keywords: Perovskite, ecotoxicity, Pseudomonas putida, respirometry© This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.