Shell thickness dependence of exciton trapping in colloidal core/shell nanorods

We quantitatively investigated, by time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy, the shell thickness dependence of exciton trapping and its effects on the PL quantum yield (QY) in colloidal CdSe/CdS/ZnS core/shell quantum rods. The defects passivation, due to a thin shell (0.6 monolayer), leads to a 2 times reduction of the trapping from both emitting and high-energy excited states, thus explaining the observed 4.3 times increase of the PL QY. Moreover, the QY decrease in the thick shell (1.3 monolayers) sample is fully explained in terms of increased trapping from the emitting states, which is ascribed to new defects caused by the strain relaxation at the core-shell interface.