Semiconductor Nanocrystal Optoelectronics Using Colloidal Quantum Wells for Lighting and Displays

Lighting and displays are integral parts of human activities and economic development. Semiconductor nanocrystals, now offering a market volume exceeding 1 Billion Euros annually, have attracted great interest in quality lighting and displays in the last decade. Such colloidal semiconductors enable enriched color conversion essential to superior lighting and displays. These colloids span different types and heterostructures of semiconductors, starting in the form of colloidal quantum dots and most recently extending to the latest sub–family of nanocrystals, the colloidal quantum wells. In this talk, we will present most recent examples of photonic structures and device architectures using the colloidal quantum wells for lighting and displays. Also, we will present a powerful, large–area self–assembly technique for orienting these colloidal quantum wells either all face down or all edge up. We will demonstrate three–dimensional constructs of their oriented self–assemblies with monolayer precision. Finally, we will show record high–efficiency colloidal LEDs of these quantum wells employed as the electrically–driven emitter layer. Given their current accelerating progress, these solution–processed quantum wells hold great promise to challenge their epitaxial thin–film counterparts in semiconductor optoelectronics in the near future.