Machine-Learning-Assisted Discovery of Mechanosynthesized Lead-Free Metal Halide Perovskites for the Oxidative Photocatalytic Cleavage of Alkenes

Lead-free metal halide perovskites can potentially be air- and water-stable photocatalysts for organic synthesis, but there are limited studies on them for this application. Separately, machine learning (ML), a critical subfield of artificial intelligence, has played a pivotal role in identifying correlations and formulating predictions based on extensive datasets. Herein, an iterative workflow by incorporating high-throughput experimental data with ML to discover new lead-free metal halide perovskite photocatalysts for the aerobic oxidation of styrene is described. Through six rounds of ML optimization guided by SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) analysis, BA2CsAg0.95Na0.05BiBr7 as a photocatalyst that afforded an 80% yield of benzoic acid under the standard conditions is identified, which is a 13-fold improvement compared to the 6% with when using Cs2AgBiBr6 as the initial photocatalyst benchmark that is started. BA2CsAg0.95Na0.05BiBr7 can tolerate various functional groups with 22 styrene derivatives, highlighting the generality of the photocatalytic properties demonstrated. Radical scavenging studies and density functional theory calculations revealed that the formation of the reactive oxygen species superoxide and singlet oxygen in the presence of BA2CsAg0.95Na0.05BiBr7 are critical for photocatalysis. Lead-free metal halide perovskite photocatalysts are discovered via a combination of mechanosyntheses, high-throughput characterization, and machine learning. After 6 rounds of iterations between experiments and machine learning, a champion perovskite photocatalyst for styrene oxidation to benzoic acid in 80% yield is achieved, representing a 13-fold improvement from the Cs2AgBiBr6 benchmark initially started with. image