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Quantum electrodynamics is rapidly finding a set of new applications in thresholdless lasing, photochemistry, and quantum entanglement due to the development of sophisticated patterning techniques to couple nanoscale photonic emitters with photonic and plasmonic cavities. Colloidal and epitaxial semiconductor nanocrystals or quantum dots (QDs) are promising candidates for emitters within these architectures but are dramatically less explored in this role than are molecular emitters. This perspective reviews the basic physics of emitter-cavity coupling in the weak-to-strong coupling regimes, describes common architectures for these systems, and lists possible applications (in particular, photochemistry), with a focus on the advantages and issues associated with using QDs as the emitters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This Letter describes the use of CdSe quantum dots (QDs) as photocatalysts for photoinduced electron transfer reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (PET-RAFT) polymerization of a series of aqueous acrylamides and acrylates. The high colloidal solubility and photostability of these QDs allowed polymerization to occur with high efficiency (>90% conversion in 2.5 h), low dispersity (PDI < 1.1), and ultralow catalyst loading (<0.5 ppm). The use of protein concentrators enabled the removal of the photocatalyst from the polymer and monomer with tolerable metal contamination (8.41 ug/g). These isolated QDs could be recycled for four separate polymerizations without a significant decrease in efficiency. By changing the pore size of the protein concentrators, the QDs and polymer could be separated from the remaining monomer, allowing for the synthesis of block copolymers using a single batch of QDs with minimal purification steps and demonstrating the fidelity of chain ends.