New class of nanoparticle brings cheaper, lighter solar cells outdoors

Think those flat, glassy solar panels on your neighbour’s roof are the pinnacle of solar technology? Think again.

Researchers in the University of Toronto’s Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering have designed and tested a new class of solar-sensitive nanoparticle that outshines the current state of the art employing this new class of technology.

This new form of solid, stable light-sensitive nanoparticles, called colloidal quantum dots, could lead to cheaper and more flexible solar cells, as well as better gas sensors, infrared lasers, infrared light emitting diodes and more. The work, led by post-doctoral researcher Zhijun Ning and Professor Ted Sargent, was published this week in Nature Materials.

Improved performance is just a start for this new quantum-dot-based solar cell architecture. The powerful little dots could be mixed into inks and painted or printed onto thin, flexible surfaces, such as roofing shingles, dramatically lowering the cost and accessibility of solar power for millions of people.

The Latest on: Colloidal Quantum Dots

Colloidal quantum dot lasers poised to come of age - Newswise
February 17, 2021
Electrical control of single-photon emission in highly charged individual colloidal quantum dots - Science Advances
September 18, 2020
Scientists age quantum dots in a test tube - EurekAlert
November 19, 2020
Ultrastable low-cost colloidal quantum dot microlasers of operative temperature up to 450 K - EurekAlert
April 13, 2021
Breakthrough quantum-dot transistors create a flexible alternative to conventional electronics - Science Daily
October 29, 2020
Colloidal quantum-dot light emitters go broadband in the IR, can be electrically driven - Laser Focus World
October 2, 2020
Artificial Chemist 2.0: Quantum Dot R&D in Less Than an Hour - NC State News
December 10, 2020
Quantum-Dot Transistors: A Potential Alternative to Flexible Electronics? - News - All About Circuits
November 11, 2020
Strong coupling of single quantum dots with low-refractive-index/high-refractive-index materials at room temperature - Science Advances
November 20, 2020
Quantum Dot Paint Could Make Airframe Inspection Quick and Easy - IEEE Spectrum
November 30, 2020

via Google News

The Latest on: Colloidal Quantum Dots

Observation of ordered organic capping ligands on semiconducting quantum dots via powder X-ray diffraction
on May 10, 2021 at 5:00 pm
The degree of ligand ordering on colloidal inorganic nanocrystal surfaces has long been a topic of interest. Here, the authors show that a well-known powder X-ray diffraction feature observed in prior ...
Optics, Electron Transport and Future Applications
on May 3, 2021 at 6:16 pm
A comprehensive review of cutting-edge solid state research, focusing on its prominent example - quantum dot nanostructures - this book features a broad range of techniques for fabrication of these ...
Spectroscopic terahertz imaging probes the inner structures of 0D-3D nanomaterials
on May 3, 2021 at 7:08 am
Quantum dots are most commonly fabricated using epitaxial techniques such as molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) or by colloidal chemistry. Ordinarily, an atomic force microscope (AFM) is used to image the ...
Tip-enhanced strong coupling spectroscopy, imaging, and control of a single quantum emitter
on April 30, 2021 at 5:00 pm
By reversibly and dynamically addressing single quantum dots, we observe mode splitting up to 160 meV and anticrossing over a detuning range of ~100 meV, and with subnanometer precision over the deep ...
Ultrafast exciton dynamics in InAs nanocrystal quantum dots
on April 11, 2021 at 4:51 am
Colloidal nanocrystal quantum dots with a band gap in the near infra-red have potential application as the emitters for telecommunications or in vivo imaging, or as the photo-absorbing species in next ...
Electro-plasmonic nanoantenna: A nonfluorescent optical probe for ultrasensitive label-free detection of electrophysiological signals
on April 4, 2021 at 5:01 pm
Our electro-plasmonic nanoantennas with drastically enhanced cross sections (~10 4 nm 2 compared to typical values of ~10 −2 nm 2 for voltage-sensitive fluorescence dyes and ~1 nm 2 for quantum dots) ...
Colloidal Quantum Dot Optoelectronics and Photovoltaics
on April 2, 2021 at 1:51 am
Capturing the most up-to-date research in colloidal quantum dot (CQD) devices, this book is written in an accessible style by the world's leading experts. The application of CQDs in solar cells, ...
New class of versatile, high-performance quantum dots primed for medical imaging, quantum computing
on March 26, 2021 at 4:43 pm
A new, highly versatile class of quantum dots excel as single-photon emitters ... has developed an elegant approach to synthesizing the colloidal-nanoparticle structures derived from their ...
Endothermic charge-transfer mediates shallow distance-dependent triplet energy migration
on March 24, 2021 at 5:47 am
This study was published in Nature Communications on March 9. The researchers investigated TET from colloidal CdSe quantum dots (QDs), featuring systematically varied ZnS shell thicknesses ...
Check out This New Hyper-Efficient Light-Emitting Crystal
on January 21, 2021 at 1:22 am
The team designed a way to embed strongly luminescent nanoparticles called colloidal quantum dots (the chocolate chips) into perovskite (the oatmeal cookie). The result is a black crystal that ...