CdSe quantum dots have interesting carrier transfer characteristics and can be used as photon collectors in certain kinds of hybrid photovoltaic devices. Some of these systems work through a charge transfer process from an excitonic state to a surface-adsorbed organic dye. In this article, we explore carrier transfer time scales through the characterization of the ultrafast photoluminescence behavior of nanocrystal excitonic states in the presence of adsorbed molecular charge acceptors. We show that upon physisorption of the cyanine dye Indocyanine Green, significant emission quenching due to carrier transfer can take place in a direct way from the initially pumped states in 5.7 nm diameter CdSe dots. We show that such transfer takes place independently of the excess energy above the band gap. Importantly, this near-instantaneous quenching is responsible for the loss of an important fraction of the excitonic population on a time scale much faster than intraband (hole and electron) excitonic relaxation. The time scales for the excitonic quenching and relaxation were addressed by femtosecond photoluminescence up-conversion experiments. These experiments showed that the time constants associated with the accumulation of the band-edge excitons remain unchanged upon dye physisorption; however, the signal amplitude is significantly reduced as a function of the addition of Indocyanine Green. The transient photoluminescence from the spectral region associated with states that act as intermediaries during excitonic relaxation (like the 1P3/21P and the 2S1/21S states) shows a significant reduction in the amplitude of the exponential components, but there was no difference in the transient’s time constants. These features indicate that the yield of accumulation into these transiently populated states is diminished by the presence of the cyanine dye due to near instantaneous exciton quenching of the initially formed states.

A nonclassical 3D‐printing technique, 3D NSCRIPT, which employs nonlinear blue waves from light emitting diodes (LEDs) is introduced. This technique generates micro‐ and macroscopic dielectric and metallodielectric structures with seamless depths, which would be challenging to fabricate through conventional 3D printing techniques. 3D NSCRIPT exploits divergence‐free, nonlinear self‐trapped beams elicited during epoxide polymerization to inscribe 3D structures; by embedding patterns in and varying the diameter of nonlinear beams, it is possible to control respectively the geometry and dimensions of the resulting structures. By exploiting the interactions of nonlinear beams, it is moreover possible to configure additional structural complexity. Furthermore, by coupling epoxide polymerization with the simultaneous reduction of gold salts, it is possible to generate 3D structures containing a homogeneous dispersion of Au nanoparticles. To demonstrate the versatility of this technique, various 3D components of the da Vinci catapult were fabricated and assembled into a miniature working device.