Why does the band gap

increase when decreasing

the size of nanostructures?
The spacing of the electronic levels and the bandgap increases with decreasing particle size. This is because the electron
hole pairs are now much closer together and the Coulombic interaction between them can no longer be neglected giving
an overall higher kinetic energy.

This increase in bandgap can be observed experimentally by the blue-shift in the absorption spectrum or sometimes even
visually by the colour of the samples. A larger bandgap means that more energy is required to excite an electron from the
valance band to the conduction band and hence light of a higher frequency and lower wavelength would be absorbed.