| Abstract | We report, for the first time, the synthesis of colloidal copper indium selenide (CuInSe2) nanocrystals (NCs) possessing a gradient stoichiometry that is potentially tunable by the presence of a conducting polymer, i.e., poly(3-hexyl thiophene) (P3HT) in the synthesis medium. Dibenzyl ether (DBE) was used as a reaction medium, whereas copper acetylacetonate (Cu(acac)2), indium acetylacetonate (In(acac)3), and selenium powder were used as Cu, In, and Se sources, respectively. The Se precursor was tri-n-octylphosphine selenide (TOP-Se). Without the presence of P3HT, the resulting NCs consist of a p-type (Cu1+ rich) core and an n-type (In3+ rich) shell. Such a gradient stoichiometry was moderated to be substantially more homogeneous because the presence of P3HT is believed to have significantly reduced the reactivity difference between Cu(acac) 2 and In(acac)3, as well as and their respective monomers. Furthermore, the P3HT also acts as a surface coordination species, contributing to the readily preparation of conducting polymer-NCs hybrids by a single-step synthesis. The understandings of this work can serve as a guide for design and synthesis of conducting polymer-NCs hybrids based on various ternary or quaternary compound semiconductors with different core-shell composition gradient. © 2013 American Chemical Society. |
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