Rational design and synthesis of nanowires with increasingly complex structures can yield enhanced and/or novel electronic and photonic functions. For example, Ge/Si core/shell nanowires have exhibited substantially higher performance as field-effect transistors and low-temperature quantum devices compared with homogeneous materials, and nano-roughened Si nanowires were recently shown to have an unusually high thermoelectric figure of merit. Here, we report the first multi-quantum-well (MQW) core/shell nanowire heterostructures based on well-defined III-nitride materials that enable lasing over a broad range of wavelengths at room temperature. Transmission electron microscopy studies show that the triangular GaN nanowire cores enable epitaxial and dislocation-free growth of highly uniform (InGaN/GaN)n quantum wells with n=3, 13 and 26 and InGaN well thicknesses of 1-3 nm. Optical excitation of individual MQW nanowire structures yielded lasing with InGaN quantum-well composition-dependent emission from 365 to 494 nm, and threshold dependent on quantum well number, n. Our work demonstrates a new level of complexity in nanowire structures, which potentially can yield free-standing injection nanolasers.

Subwavelength optical resonators made of high-index dielectric materials provide efficient ways to manipulate light at the nanoscale through mode interferences and enhancement of both electric and magnetic fields. Such Mie-resonant dielectric structures have low absorption, and their functionalities are limited predominantly by radiative losses. We implement a new physical mechanism for suppressing radiative losses of individual nanoscale resonators to engineer special modes with high quality factors: optical bound states in the continuum (BICs). We demonstrate that an individual subwavelength dielectric resonator hosting a BIC mode can boost nonlinear effects increasing second-harmonic generation efficiency. Our work suggests a route to use subwavelength high-index dielectric resonators for a strong enhancement of light–matter interactions with applications to nonlinear optics, nanoscale lasers, quantum photonics, and sensors.