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Machine learning predicts Cu-Al electrocatalysts provide better efficiency and productivity than copper when using intermittent renewable electricity to convert carbon dioxide to useful chemicals and fuels.

Metal halide perovskites have been studied as promising materials for blue light-emitting diodes (LEDs) but the stability is still a bottleneck. Here Wang et al. develop a chelating additive strategy to increase efficiency, operational stability and color stability of blue perovskite LEDs.

An improved ligand-exchange process allows the realization of solution-deposited films of quantum dots with reduced energetic disorder and, as a result, solar cells with improved open-circuit voltage, charge-carrier transport and stability.

Heterostructuring and mixing of disparate materials provide new degrees of freedom to control carrier mobilities and exciton binding in solution-processed semiconductors. This Review highlights recent examples of heterostructured materials and devices, and examines the future direction of the field.

Graph neural networks (GNNs) have become ubiquitous as molecular property predictors. Here, authors propose a method to use them in reverse to directly generate diverse functional molecules with desired properties.

Colloidal quantum dots are promising materials for efficient low-cost solar cells and optoelectronics, but their performance does not improve with increased carrier mobility. Here, the authors show instead that the spacing between recombination centres controls the diffusion length.

The realisation of film made up of different compositions using colloidal QD inks remains a challenge because of redispersing of underlying films by polar solvents. Here, the authors introduce aromatic ligands to achieve QD inks in weakly-polar solvents that enable fabrication of multi-compositional films.

Films of exfoliated crystals of two-dimensional hybrid metal halide perovskites with phenyl groups as organic cations show increased molecular rigidity, reduced electron–phonon interactions and blue emission with photoluminescence quantum yield approaching 80%.

Embedding quantum dots in a perovskite matrix yields efficient light emitters.

Green light-emitting diodes with a brightness of 460,000 cd m^–2 and a low turn-on voltage of 2.5 V are enabled by the use of a chlorination treatment to provide conductive passivation of the devices.

High-throughput materials discovery can reduce the time taken to identify high-performing materials. Here, compositionally-graded films are fabricated in a binary halide perovskite system, of interest for solar cells, and their stability investigated during artificial aging.

Dipole–dipole interactions in mixed-phase CdZnSeS quantum dots enable the effective orientation of the quantum dots and improved photon out-coupling when employed in a light emitting diode.

Colloidal quantum dots and organics have complementary properties apt for photovoltaics, yet their combination has led to poor charge collection. Here, Baek et al. introduce small molecules that act as a bridge between quantum dots and polymers, thus improving device efficiency and stability.

Despite their high efficiencies, perovskite solar cells still suffer from degradation issues that impede their practical deployment. Saidaminov et al. explore the effect of local lattice strain on vacancy formation and show that careful choice of dopants plays a key role, enhancing the device stability.

It is challenging to realize doping and surface passivation simultaneously in colloidal quantum dot inks. Here Choi et al. employ a cascade surface modification approach to solve the problem and obtain record high efficiency of 13.3% for bulk homojunction solar cells based on these inks.

By switching shell growth on and off on the (0001) facet of wurtzite CdSe cores to produce a built-in biaxial strain that lowers the optical gain threshold, we achieve continuous-wave lasing in colloidal quantum dot films.

We report assembly of an organic scaffold within perovskite structures, resulting in the suppression of the lone pair expression of Ge and templating the symmetric octahedra.

Centrifugal casting is widely used to fabricate functional materials that exhibit built-in spatial gradients due to the variation in material density. Kim et al.use this method to prepare colloidal quantum dot films for the first time, based on which photodetectors with gradient bandgap are built.

Efficient implementation of quantum dot and well architectures are restricted to costly vacuum-epitaxially-grown semiconductors. The authors use quantum dots in perovskite to build field-emission photodiodes that are sensitive across the visible and into the short-wavelength infrared.

Metal halide perovskites are promising for solar energy harvesting, but currently prone to a large hysteresis and current instability. Here, Xu et al. show improvements in a hybrid material in which the fullerene is distributed at perovskite grain boundaries and thus passivates defects effectively.

To date, lasing in colloidal quantum dot solids has been limited to the nanosecond temporal range, limiting the potential for solution-processed lasers. Here, the authors combine thermal management with low amplified spontaneous emission threshold to produce microsecond-sustained lasing.

Nanometre-sized clusters can self-organize into centimetre-scale hierarchical structures, mimicking the complex constructions seen in nature and providing a platform to design synthetically directed advanced materials with sophisticated functions.

Efficient harvest of solar energy beyond the silicon absorption edge of 1100 nm by semiconductor solar cells remains a challenge. Here Sun et al. mix high multi-bandgap lead sulfide colloidal quantum dot ensembles to further increase both short circuit current and open circuit voltage.

Reduced-dimensional halide perovskites are promising for light-emitting diodes but suffer from photo-degradation. Here Quan et al. identify the edge of the perovskite nanoplatelets as the degradation channels and use phosphine oxides to passivate the edges and boost device performance and lifetime.

The precise control over nanoscale structures is crucial in developing new, functional nanomaterials. Here, authors demonstrate a controllable method to epitaxially stack CdS quantum dots into ZnS nanowires and show improved photocatalytic hydrogen evolution activities.

The performance of wide-bandgap perovskite photovoltaics is limited by the undesired phase transition and high density of deep level traps. Here, Tan et al. incorporate dipolar methylammonium cation to make the material defect-tolerant and achieve a high power conversion efficiency of 20.7%.

Reliable and consistent measurement of the carrier diffusion length in metal halide perovskite single crystals has proven difficult. Here Gong, Huang et al. systematically included very dilute quantum dot quenchers into perovskite crystals and develop a contactless and self-consistent method for the task.

Integrating electrocatalytic H₂ production with biological H₂-fed systems for CO₂ upgrading requires H₂ generation to occur in biocompatible media—typically with neutral pH. Here, the authors design multi-site H₂ evolution catalysts that minimize the water dissociation barrier and promote hydride coupling in neutral media.

Perovskite light-emitting diodes show promising color tunability and device performance but suffer from emission color shift at higher driving voltages. Here Xing et al. report color stable blue light-emitting diodes by drastically increasing the phase purity of the quasi-2D perovskite thin films.

Deep-blue high-colour-purity light-emitting materials are developed by using amine-based edge passivation. The light-emitting diodes based on the carbon dots exhibit a maximum luminance of 5,240 cd m^–2 and an external quantum efficiency of 4%.

Multimetal oxyhydroxides are among the most active catalysts for alkaline water oxidation, but tuning their properties remains a challenge. Now, the performance of NiFe- and FeCo-based catalysts is optimized with the incorporation of high-valence modulator metals, which shifts the active metals towards lower valence states and enables lower overpotentials.

Formamidinium-lead-iodide-based perovskites have a preferred bandgap below 1.55 eV for solar cell applications but suffer from operational instability. Here, Zhao et al. improve the film quality using cesium-containing seeded growth to show high stabilized efficiency and more than 100 h lifetime under simulated sunlight.

Water oxidation is key to the production of chemical fuels from electricity. Now, guided by theory, NiCoFeP oxyhydroxide catalysts have been developed that require an overpotential lower than that required by IrO₂. In situ soft X-ray absorption studies of neutral-pH NiCoFeP catalysts indicate formation of Ni⁴⁺, which is favourable for water oxidation.

Light-emitting diodes based on mixed-dimensionality perovskite solids show outstanding radiative properties in the near-infrared region.

Although several techniques have been reported to obtain electron-rich colloidal quantum dots, these materials usually suffer from poor stability under air exposure. It is now shown that the use of strongly bound ligands and a careful ligands-exchange strategy lead to air-stable n-type quantum dots that can be used in solar cells and chemical sensors.

X-ray scattering and density functional theory calculations reveal that ligand-induced tensile stress can distort the rock-salt structure of small PbS and PbSe colloidal quantum dots, creating a Pb-deficient core surrounded by a Pb-enriched shell.

Solution processed colloidal quantum dots are emerging photovoltaic materials with tuneable infrared bandgaps. Here, Yang et al. create a class of quantum dot bulk heterojunction solar cell via ligand design, enabling longer photocarrier diffusion lengths for greater photocurrent and performance.

A new matrix engineering strategy enables improvements of CQD solar cell efficiency via considerable enhancement of the photocarrier diffusion length.

The stability of both colloidal quantum dots and perovskites can be improved by combining them into a hybrid material in which matched lattice parameters suppress the formation of undesired phases.

A solution-based ligand-exchange strategy enables the realization of close-packed quantum dot solid films with near-unity photoluminescence quantum yield and high charge carrier mobility.

Embedding perovskite quantum dots in perovskite leads to bright, efficient 980 nm LEDs with applications in imaging and sensing.

Spin-polarized photon absorption and photoluminescence are reported in reduced-dimensional chiral perovskite materials. The finding indicates that such materials may in the future be useful as a photonic interface for spintronics.

Improved performance in a photovoltaic device made of colloidal quantum dots is achieved through a combination of passivation by halide anions and organic crosslinking.

Organohalide perovskites and preformed colloidal quantum dots are combined in the solution phase to produce epitaxially aligned ‘dots-in-a-matrix’ crystals that have both the excellent electrical transport properties of the perovskite matrix and the high radiative efficiency of the quantum dots.

Gold and palladium nanoneedle electrocatalysts benefit from field-induced reagent concentration to improve the efficiency of carbon dioxide reduction in the synthesis of carbon-based fuels using renewable electricity.