The researchers used a self assembling blend of caesium, bromine and lead to create the nanowires and pointed out the same blend has proven effective in high efficiency solar cells. “What’s amazing is the simplicity of the chemistry,” said Peidong Yang, a chemist in Berkeley Labs’ Materials “There has been so much progress with these materials in just the past several years and I have a feeling these materials will open a new research frontier for optoelectronics.”
Selected nanowires were placed on a quartz base and excited by another laser, causing them to emit light. Researchers found the nanowire lasers emitted light for more than 1billion cycles after being hit by an ultrafast pulse of visible violet light.
The team says there are opportunities to test other materials and learn whether they improve performance, including substituting tin for lead.
