We investigate the emission of single photons from CdSe/CdS dot-in-rods which are optically trapped in the focus of a deep parabolic mirror. Thanks to this mirror, we are able to image almost the full 4$pi$ emission pattern of nanometer-sized elementary dipoles and verify the alignment of the rods within the optical trap. From the motional dynamics of the emitters in the trap we infer that the single-photon emission occurs from clusters comprising several emitters. We demonstrate the optical trapping of rod-shaped quantum emitters in a configuration suitable for efficiently coupling an ensemble of linear dipoles with the electromagnetic field in free space.
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