Doped Semiconductor Nanocrystals (d-Dots) @ University of Oklahoma / University of Arkansas

We have achieved the colloidal growth of ZnSe doped (Cu and Mn) quantum dots. We demonstrate that doping chemistry of colloidal nanocrystals is much more complex than what has  been proposed in the existing experimental and theoretical reports. Four individual processes: “surface adsorption”, “lattice incorporation”, “lattice diffusion”, and “lattice ejection”. Each process possesses its own critical temperature. A given type of host nanocrystals can be switched from being impossible to dope to becoming successfully doped. The key is to program the reaction temperature to accommodate all elementary processes. The fluorescence shown here depends on size and dopant.