Photoluminescence from semiconductor cadmium selenide nanocrystals

In this dissertation, the photoluminescence (PL) emission properties from different CdSe nanocrystals (NCs) dispersed in polymer thin films were investigated. The PL spectroscopy was used as a probing tool to study core and surface-related emission properties of the CdSe NCs under investigation. The results found in these studies are promising from the point of view of fundamental understanding as well as the possible employments of the emission properties of CdSe NCs in certain technological applications. The studies presented in this dissertation include the following: (i) PL polarization spectroscopy of single CdSe NCs was performed on a system of colloidal CdSe quantum rods (QRs). Our experimental measurements suggest a strong polarization dependence of both excitation and emission, and confirm the unique linear dipole in the QRs along the long axis of the rod, i.e. the c axis of wurtzite structure, which is in agreement with the previous theoretical predictions. These results are very important because it represents an experimental test to the available theoretical models used in exploring the rich electronic spectra of these NC systems. These results also show the importance of the shape anisotropy on the electronic spectrum of NCs. (ii) Environmental effects on the PL from highly luminescent bare-core CdSe and core/shell CdSe/ZnS NCs were systematically investigated under different atmospheric environments and photo-irradiation conditions. In this study, the PL was used as a probe to detect changes in the electronic spectrum of the NCs due to photo-induced interactions on the surface of the NCs with the local surrounding atmosphere. Such studies are very important to provide a good understanding of the optimum operational conditions for emission applications of NCs in solid-state devices and also give a simple way of studying the surface of the NCs indirectly by investigating the surface interactions with different molecular systems and their effects on the optical emission properties. (iii) The highly luminescent CdSe NCs were employed in a PL-based sensing scheme to detect gases from the amine group. These results are the first experimental demonstration of such sensing capabilities using semiconductor NCs.