TEM Analysis

This year, we worked with Dr. Robert Simmons, a research professor at Georgia State University, to take scanning electron microscopy pictures of these quantum dots. The purpose behind this was to see if the cadmium-free quantum dots we synthesized had any similarities to CdSe quantum dots in terms of crystal structure.

   The results show that the particle size of the CuInS2 quantum dots increase across 15, 30, and 45 minutes. This re-affirms what was already known about quantum dots: altering their crystal size allows them to absorb more solar radiation. This makes sense, since in our power graph (in Results: Power), there was a steady increase in power output across 15, 30, and 45 minutes.

   Unfortunately, we were not able to test on CuInSe2 quantum dots, as there was not enough substance after testing to use for the scanning electron microscope. However, we believe that if we could take images, they would also show an increase in size across 15, 30, and 45 minutes.