Griffith University researcher have found huge new possibilities  for light harvesting  through narrowing the bandgap of titania and graphene quantum dots.Team of researcher’s  found a quantum-confined bandgap narrowing mechanism where UV absorption of the grapheme quantum dots and TiO2 nanoparticles can easily be extended into the visible light range.

Such a mechanism may allow the design of a new class of composite materials for light harvesting and optoelectronics.

“We were truly eager to find this: when two UV absorbing materials, namely  TiO2 and graphene quantum dots, were mixed together, they began to absorb in the visible range, more significantly, the bandgap can be tuned by the size of graphene quantum dot,” says Dr Li .“We named the phenomenon ‘quantum-confined bandgap narrowing’ and this mechanism may be applicable to all semiconductors, when they are linked with graphene quantum dots. Flexible tuning of bandgap is extremely desirable in semiconductor-based devices.”

Source: Griffith University