Superfluorescent scintillation from coupled perovskite quantum dots

Scintillation, the process of converting high-energy radiation into detectable visible light underpins technologies from medical imaging to particle physics, yet conventional scintillators are limited by the oscillator strength of their individual emission centers. Here, we propose and demonstrate quantum optical scintillators, showcasing collective scintillation under X-ray excitation, where quantum correlations between emitters accelerate their emission beyond the intrinsic individual-oscillator rate. The effect appears as a red-shifted spectral peak and an enhanced emission rate, with an average lifetime of 230 ps at 80 K, 14× faster than room-temperature spontaneous emission. Unlike UV-driven superfluorescence, each X-ray photon generates a photoelectron that excites multiple neighboring, coupled quantum dots, producing a faster rate, larger spectral shift, and broader spectrum. We characterize the temperature-dependent temporal response using a Hanbury-Brown-Twiss g (2) (τ) setup. A many-body quantum-optics theory reproduces both UV- and X-ray-driven regimes. These quantum enhancements surpass emission-rate limits and could substantially improve time-of-flight detector performance.