Scintillators convert high-energy radiation, such as X-rays and gamma rays, into visible or near-visible photons, underpinning technologies in medical imaging, security screening, and high-energy physics [1]. Their performance is typically defined by light yield, decay time, and radiation hardness, which in conventional materials are largely dictated by bulk crystal chemistry and fixed radiative pathways. Overcoming these intrinsic limitations remains a central challenge in the development of next-generation scintillators.

Perovskite materials have recently emerged as promising candidates in this context, owing to their compositional tunability, solution processability, and exceptional optoelectronic properties [2]. In scintillation, they enable a transition from conventional bulk optimization to quantum-engineered functionality, in which reduced dimensionality, nanoscale structuring, and tailored light-matter interactions provide new handles to control energy conversion processes [3-6]. This shift opens opportunities to redefine performance limits beyond those accessible in traditional scintillators.

Low-dimensional perovskites, including PEA₂PbBr₄, BA₂PbBr₄, CsCu₂I₃, and Cs₃Cu₂I₅, exhibit strong quantum confinement and enhanced excitonic effects, resulting in high light yields between 10 ph/keV and 60 ph/keV with fast scintillation lifetimes between 3 and 1000 ns at room temperature (RT) [3-5]. Their tunable emission and large exciton binding energies contribute to improved scintillation performance relative to bulk systems. Structural engineering strategies, such as ligand modification [7], ion doping [8,9], and anion substitution [10], enable precise control over band structure and defect landscapes, allowing simultaneous optimization of spectral and temporal response. At the nanoscale, quantum dots and related architectures introduce further control via size-dependent electronic structure and multiexciton dynamics, enabling enhanced light yield, ultrafast emission, and improved radiation stability compared to bulk counterparts [5,6]. For example, large improvements in light yield were achieved in quantum dots, with the RT light yield reaching approximately 30 ph/keV, compared to less than 0.1 ph/keV in bulks [6].

Beyond materials design, engineered light-matter coupling provides an additional route to control scintillation. Nanophotonic and plasmonic structures can modify the local density of optical states, enabling Purcell-enhanced emission and cavity quantum electrodynamics effects [11,12], while energy-transfer processes such as Förster resonance energy transfer further improve emission efficiency and timing characteristics [9]. Together, these advances establish perovskite scintillators as a platform that integrates quantum materials design with photonic engineering, offering new opportunities for high-performance radiation detection and emerging applications in imaging and sensing.