Figure 4.

Structure and charge carrier properties of CdTe QDs and cation-exchanged Hg_xCd_1-xTe QDs. (a) Schematic illustrations of CdTe QDs, homogeneous alloy Hg_xCd_1-xTe QDs, or core/shell CdTe/HgTe QDs generated through Cd²⁺ replacement by Hg²⁺. (b) Energy band diagrams showing the valence and conduction bands (grey), potential energy wells (black lines), and quantum-confined kinetic energy levels (red lines) of electrons and holes in each QD, as calculated using the effective mass approximation. (c–d) RDF (Ψ²r², nm⁻¹) plots of the electron (e) and hole (h) for the 1^st and 2^nd excitons. Wavefunction overlap integrals (φ) are also provided. Constructive overlap is schematically depicted as green and destructive overlap is black.