Coupling the computational with the sensational: Merging quantum dots, biomolecules, and polymers for record performance from solution-processed optoelectronics

We apply discoveries in nanoscience towards applications relevant to health, environment, security, and connectedness. We work with colloidal quantum dots, nanoparticles produced in, and processed from, solution. They can be coated onto nearly anything - a semiconductor substrate, a window, a wall, fabric. Compared to epitaxially-grown semiconductors used to make optical detectors, lasers, and modulators, they are cheap, safe to work with, and easy to produce. Much of our work with quantum dots involves infrared light - its measurement, production, modulation, and harnessing. While there exists an abundance of work in colloidal quantum dots active in the visible, there are fewer results in the infrared. The wavelengths between 1000 and 2000 nm are nonetheless of great practical importance.