No Arabic abstract
Majorana fermions, quantum particles with non-Abelian exchange statistics, are not only of fundamental importance, but also building blocks for fault-tolerant quantum computation. Although certain experimental breakthroughs for observing Majorana fermions have been made recently, their conclusive dection is still challenging due to the lack of proper material properties of the underlined experimental systems. Here we propose a new platform for Majorana fermions based on edge states of certain non-topological two-dimensional semiconductors with strong spin-orbit coupling, such as monolayer group-VI transition metal dichalcogenides (TMD). Using first-principles calculations and tight-binding modeling, we show that zigzag edges of monolayer TMD can host well isolated single edge band with strong spin-orbit coupling energy. Combining with proximity induced s-wave superconductivity and in-plane magnetic fields, the zigzag edge supports robust topological Majorana bound states at the edge ends, although the two-dimensional bulk itself is non-topological. Our findings points to a controllable and integrable platform for searching and manipulating Majorana fermions.
The valley degree of freedom is a sought-after quantum number in monolayer transition-metal dichalcogenides. Similar to optical spin orientation in semiconductors, the helicity of absorbed photons can be relayed to the valley (pseudospin) quantum number of photoexcited electrons and holes. Also similar to the quantum-mechanical spin, the valley quantum number is not a conserved quantity. Valley depolarization of excitons in monolayer transition-metal dichalcogenides due to long-range electron-hole exchange typically takes a few ps at low temperatures. Exceptions to this behavior are monolayers MoSe$_2$ and MoTe$_2$ wherein the depolarization is much faster. We elucidate the enigmatic anomaly of these materials, finding that it originates from Rashba-induced coupling of the dark and bright exciton branches next to their degeneracy point. When photoexcited excitons scatter during their energy relaxation between states next to the degeneracy region, they reach the light cone after losing the initial helicity. The valley depolarization is not as fast in monolayers WSe$_2$, WS$_2$ and likely MoS$_2$ wherein the Rashba-induced coupling is negligible.
We report charged exciton (trion) formation dynamics in doped monolayer transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs), specifically molybdenum diselenide (MoSe2), using resonant two-color pump-probe spectroscopy. When resonantly pumping the exciton transition, trions are generated on a picosecond timescale through exciton-electron interaction. As the pump energy is tuned from the high energy to low energy side of the inhomogeneously broadened exciton resonance, the trion formation time increases by ~ 50%. This feature can be explained by the existence of both localized and delocalized excitons in a disordered potential and suggests the existence of an exciton mobility edge in TMDs. The quasiparticle formation and conversion processes are important for interpreting photoluminescence and photoconductivity in TMDs.
Being atomically thin and amenable to external controls, two-dimensional (2D) materials offer a new paradigm for the realization of patterned qubit fabrication and operation at room temperature for quantum information sciences applications. Here we show that the antisite defect in 2D transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) can provide a controllable solid-state spin qubit system. Using high-throughput atomistic simulations, we identify several neutral antisite defects in TMDs that lie deep in the bulk band gap and host a paramagnetic triplet ground state. Our in-depth analysis reveals the presence of optical transitions and triplet-singlet intersystem crossing processes for fingerprinting these defect qubits. As an illustrative example, we discuss the initialization and readout principles of an antisite qubit in WS2, which is expected to be stable against interlayer interactions in a multilayer structure for qubit isolation and protection in future qubit-based devices. Our study opens a new pathway for creating scalable, room-temperature spin qubits in 2D TMDs.
Impurities play an important role during recombination processes in semiconductors. Their important role is sharpened in atomically-thin transition-metal dichalcogenides whose two-dimensional character renders electrons and holes highly susceptible to localization caused by remote charged impurities. We study a multitude of phenomena that arise from the interaction of localized electrons with excitonic complexes. Emphasis is given to the amplification of the phonon-assisted recombination of biexcitons when it is mediated by localized electrons, showing that this mechanism can explain recent photoluminescence experiments in ML-WSe$_2$. In addition, the magnetic-field dependence of this mechanism is analyzed. The results of this work point to (i) an intriguing coupling between the longitudinal-optical and homopolar phonon modes that can further elucidate various experimental results, (ii) the physics behind a series of localization-induced optical transitions in tungsten-based materials, and (iii) the importance of localization centers in facilitating the creation of biexcitons and exciton-exciton annihilation processes.
Orbital Hall effect (OHE) is the phenomenon of transverse flow of orbital moment in presence of an applied electric field. Solids with broken inversion symmetry are expected to exhibit a strong OHE due to the presence of an intrinsic orbital moment at individual momentum points in the Brillouin zone, which in presence of an applied electric field, flows in different directions causing a net orbital Hall current. Here we provide a comprehensive understanding of the effect and its tunability in the monolayer 2D transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs). Both metallic and insulating TMDCs are investigated from full density-functional calculations, effective $d$-band tight-binding models, as well as a minimal four-band model for the valley points that captures the key physics of the system. For the tuning of the OHE, we examine the role of hole doping as well as the change in the band parameters, which, e. g., can be controlled by strain. We demonstrate that the OHE is a more fundamental effect than the spin Hall effect (SHE), with the momentum-space orbital moments inducing a spin moment in the presence of the spin-orbit coupling, leading to the SHE. The physics of the OHE, described here, is relevant for 2D materials with broken inversion symmetry in general, even beyond the TMDCs, providing a broad platform for future research.