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Band gaps are one of the most important parameters of semiconductor materials for their optoelectronic applications since they determine the spectral features of absorptions and emission processes. Due to the limited band gaps of natural semiconductors, alloying semiconductors of different band gaps has long been one of the standard methods of achieving semiconductors with new band gaps. In this talk, I will report our recent progress on the band gap engineering of 1D semiconductor nanowires and 2D atomically thin layered materials. Using some examples, I will show how to realize band gap tunability through composition control, and how to achieve graded and interface sharped bandgap design based on a single nanostructure, respectively. The engineered nanostructure alloys can give continuously tunable light emissions covering the entire ultraviolet-visible wavelength range. More importantly, we realized wavelength-tunable nanolasers, nanoscaled white lighting, wavelength splitter, asymmetric waveguiding and high-performance photodetectors using these novel band gap-engineered nanostructures. |