Chemistry of InP Nanocrystal Syntheses

Abstract

Chemically synthesized InP nanocrystals (NCs) are drawing a large interest as a potentially less toxic alternative to CdSe-based nanocrystals. With a bulk band gap of 1.35 eV and an exciton Bohr radius of ∼10 nm the emission wavelength of InP NCs can in principle be tuned throughout the whole visible and near-infrared range by changing their size. Furthermore, a few works reported fluorescence quantum yields exceeding 70% after overcoating the core NCs with appropriate shell materials. Therefore, InP NCs are very promising for use in lighting and display applications. On the other hand, a number of challenges remain to be addressed in order to progress from isolated research results to robust and reproducible synthesis methods for high quality InP NCs. First of all, the size distribution of the as-synthesized NCs needs to be reduced, which directly translates into more narrow emission line widths. Next, reliable protocols are required for achieving a given emission wavelength at high reaction yield and fo...