MIT chemist Moungi Bawendi and Victor Klimov of Los Alamos National Lab have developed a way to create quantum-dot lasers from nanometer-size semiconductor particles.

Quantum dots, so called because quantum effects tune the color of the glow to the size of the particle, could be a boon for optical networking by providing lasers and amplifiers that work in a wide range of frequencies.

Bawendi and Klimov have discovered that when the dots in a cadmium selenide film are crammed close enough together, a cascade of photons is generated when the dots are stimulated with a powerful pump of light.