Introducing a few atoms of impurities or dopants in semiconductor nanocrystals can drastically alter the existing properties or even introduce new properties. For example, mid-gap states created by doping tremendously affect photocatalytic activities and surface controlled redox reactions, generate new emission centers, show thermometric optical switching, make FRET donors by enhancing the excited state lifetime, and also create localized surface plasmon resonance induced low energy absorption. In addition, researchers have more recently started focusing their attention on doped nanocrystals as an important and alternative material for solar energy conversion to meet the current demand for renewable energy. Moreover, the electrical and magnetic properties of the host are also strongly altered on doping. These beneficial dopant-induced changes suggest that doped nanocrystals with proper selections of dopant–host pairs may be helpful for generating designer materials for a wide range of current technological needs. How properties relate to the doping of a variety of semiconductor nanocrystals are summarized in this Review.

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掺杂半导体纳米晶体的发光，等离子和磁性

在半导体纳米晶体中引入一些杂质或掺杂剂原子会极大地改变现有的性能，甚至引入新的性能。例如，通过掺杂产生的中间能隙状态极大地影响了光催化活性和表面控制的氧化还原反应，产生了新的发射中心，显示出了测温光开关，通过增强激发态寿命来使FRET供体，还产生了局部表面等离子体激元共振诱发的低能吸收。此外，研究人员最近开始将注意力集中在掺杂的纳米晶体上，这是一种重要的太阳能替代材料，可以满足当前对可再生能源的需求。而且，掺杂时主体的电学和磁学性质也被强烈地改变。这些有益的掺杂剂引起的变化表明，与掺杂剂的宿主对适当选择掺杂的纳米晶体可以是用于产生设计者材料广泛的当前技术需要有帮助的。本综述总结了性能与各种半导体纳米晶体的掺杂之间的关系。