Solution-processed semiconductor devices are increasingly exploiting heterostructuring — an approach in which two or more materials with different energy landscapes are integrated into a composite system. Heterostructured materials offer an additional degree of freedom to control charge transport and recombination for more efficient optoelectronic devices. By exploiting energetic asymmetry, rationally engineered heterostructured materials can overcome weaknesses, augment strengths and introduce emergent physical phenomena that are otherwise inaccessible to single-material systems. These systems see benefit and application in two distinct branches of charge-carrier manipulation. First, they influence the balance between excitons and free charges to enhance electron extraction in solar cells and photodetectors. Second, they promote radiative recombination by spatially confining electrons and holes, which increases the quantum efficiency of light-emitting diodes. In this Review, we discuss advances in the design and composition of heterostructured materials, consider their implementation in semiconductor devices and examine unexplored paths for future advancement in the field.

溶液处理的半导体器件正在越来越多地利用异质结构-一种将两种或多种具有不同能量分布的材料集成到复合系统中的方法。异质结构材料为控制电荷传输和复合提供了更高的自由度，从而可以实现更高效的光电器件。通过利用能量不对称性，合理设计的异质结构材料可以克服缺点，增强强度并引入新兴的物理现象，而这些现象是单材料系统无法达到的。这些系统在电荷载流子操纵的两个不同分支中看到了好处和应用。首先，它们影响激子和自由电荷之间的平衡，以增强太阳能电池和光电探测器中的电子提取。第二，它们通过在空间上限制电子和空穴来促进辐射复合，从而提高了发光二极管的量子效率。在这篇综述中，我们讨论了异质结构材料的设计和组成方面的进展，考虑了它们在半导体器件中的实现，并探讨了该领域未来发展的未探索之路。