Actively manipulating electronic excitations in nanocrystals
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Southampton
Department Name: Sch of Physics and Astronomy
Abstract
Colloidal nanocrystals made of semiconductor materials resemble fluorescent beads that are only a few nanometres in diameter. Their optical emission properties can be tuned from ultraviolet to infrared wavelengths by suitably choosing the material and adjusting their size and shape. To date, nanocrystals have been exploited in areas ranging from genomic and proteomic bio-assays, cell-staining and high-throughput screening, where they serve as fluorescence markers and more applications have been envisaged in LEDs, lasers, optical switches, photovoltaics, data storage devices, catalysis, drug delivery and other biomedical assays. Compared to self-assembled quantum dots made by molecular beam epitaxy, colloidal nanocrystals can be produced by comparatively simple and inexpensive solution methods, and are freely suspended in a solvent or matrix, while retaining a high optical and electronic stability. The precisely controlled size and shape of nanocrystals, such as in quantum dots, rods or even tetrapods, renders them promising building blocks for nanoscience and nanotechnology. Furthermore, shape control in the synthesis of colloidal nanocrystals offers unprecedented abilities to tune the interaction of solid state quantum structures with the environment, opening up the possibility of performing nanoscale manipulations of the optical and electronic properties. This 'First Grant' proposal aims for key experimental studies on the fundamental properties of colloidal nanocrystals. The overall plan is to develop novel applications based on the active manipulation of the optoelectronic properties of nanocrystals and on self-assembly methods for their alignment in large array device configurations. The ultimate applications range from electric-field nanosensors, single photon tunable sources to optical memory elements and all optical parallel processing.
Organisations
Publications
Andreakou P
(2011)
Colloidal nanoprobes for the optical detection of ethanol
Rindermann JJ
(2011)
Dependence of resonance energy transfer on exciton dimensionality.
in Physical review letters
Andreakou P
(2012)
Detection of ultra-low refractive index variations with colloidal nanoprobes
in Sensors and Actuators B: Chemical
Itskos G
(2007)
Efficient dipole-dipole coupling of Mott-Wannier and Frenkel excitons in (Ga,In)N quantum well/polyfluorene semiconductor heterostructures
in Physical Review B
Chanyawadee S
(2009)
Efficient light harvesting in hybrid CdTe nanocrystal/bulk GaAs p-i-n photovoltaic devices
in Applied Physics Letters
Becker K
(2007)
Exciton accumulation in pi-conjugated wires encapsulated by light-harvesting macrocycles.
in Angewandte Chemie (International ed. in English)
Rindermann JJ
(2011)
Gauging the flexibility of fluorescent markers for the interpretation of fluorescence resonance energy transfer.
in Journal of the American Chemical Society
Liao Y
(2014)
Highly Efficient Flexible Hybrid Nanocrystal-Cu(In,Ga)Se 2 (CIGS) Solar Cells
in Advanced Energy Materials
Lagoudakis P
(2011)
Hybrid optoelectronics for light harvesting and light emitting applications
Description | We initiated a new field of research that of Hybrid Photonics where we combine organic and inorganic materials for light harvesting and light emitting devices |
Exploitation Route | Used by PV and LED manufacturers |
Sectors | Education,Energy,Manufacturing, including Industrial Biotechology |
URL | http://www.hybrid.soton.ac.uk/ |
Description | The research outcomes have been published in high impact journals, presented at international conferences, and led to an invention (patent) |
First Year Of Impact | 2009 |
Sector | Education,Energy,Other |
Impact Types | Societal,Economic |