Advocates of quantum dots have hailed the technology as capable of delivering...

Advocates of quantum dots have hailed the technology as capable of delivering OLED-like color performance to mainstream-priced LCD panels. Now, researchers from the University of Alabama in Huntsville and the University of Oklahoma have found a new way to control the properties of quantum dots, said an article published Tuesday in the Journal of Applied Physics (http://bit.ly/1t4Zgc1). A key property of quantum dots that makes them so useful is their fluorescence, the article said. But their ability to glow can deteriorate over time with exposure to light and air, it said. To probe how to better control how quantum dots react to their environment, researchers exposed several types of commercially available quantum dots to aluminum oxide, it said. They found that aluminum oxide made the quantum dots glow brighter and that the effect was much more significant for quantum dots without protective shells, it said. They also found that while quantum dots with binary (two types of semiconductors) and ternary (three types) cores shrink after reacting with the oxygen in air, ternary core dots placed on aluminum oxide glowed brighter despite the shrinkage, it said. This observation surprised the researchers, they don’t yet have an explanation for the difference, and they're continuing to study it, it said.