No Arabic abstract
Transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) are an exciting family of 2D materials; a member of this family, MoS$_2$, became the first measured monolayer semiconductor. In this article, a generalized phenomenological continuum model for the optical vibrations of the monolayer TMDs valid in the long-wavelength limit is developed. Non-polar oscillations involve differential equations for the phonon displacement vector that describe phonon dispersion up to a quadratic approximation. On the other hand, the polar modes satisfy coupled differential equations for the displacement vectors and the inner electric field. The two-dimensional phonon dispersion curves for in-plane and out-of-plane oscillations are thoroughly analyzed. This model provides an efficient approach to obtain the phonon dispersion curves at the $Gamma$-point of the Brillouin zone of the whole family of TMD monolayers. The model parameters are fitted from density functional perturbation theory calculations. A detailed evaluation of the intravalley Pekar-Frohlich (P-F) and the $A_1$-homopolar mode deformation potential (Dp) coupling mechanisms is performed. The effects of metal ions and chalcogen atoms on polaron mass and binding energy are studied, considering these two contributions, the short-range Dp and P-F. It is argued that both mechanisms must be considered for a correct analysis of the polaron properties.
Strain in two-dimensional (2D) transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) has led to localized states with exciting optical properties, in particular in view of designing one photon sources. The naturally formed of the MoS2 monolayer deposed on hBN substrate leads to a reduction of the bandgap in the strained region creating a nanobubble. The photogenerated particles are thus confined in the strain-induced potential. Using numerical diagonalization, we simulate the spectra of the confined exciton states, their oscillator strengths and radiative lifetimes. We show that a single state of the confined exciton is optically active, which suggests that the MoS2/hBN nanobubble is a good candidate for the realisation of single-photon sources. Furthermore, the exciton binding energy, oscillator strength and radiative lifetime are enhanced due to the confinement effect.
The electron valley and spin degree of freedom in monolayer transition-metal dichalcogenides can be manipulated in optical and transport measurements performed in magnetic fields. The key parameter for determining the Zeeman splitting, namely the separate contribution of the electron and hole g-factor, is inaccessible in most measurements. Here we present an original method that gives access to the respective contribution of the conduction and valence band to the measured Zeeman splitting. It exploits the optical selection rules of exciton complexes, in particular the ones involving inter-valley phonons, avoiding strong renormalization effects that compromise single particle g-factor determination in transport experiments. These studies yield a direct determination of single band g factors. We measure gc1= 0.86, gc2=3.84 for the bottom (top) conduction bands and gv=6.1 for the valence band of monolayer WSe2. These measurements are helpful for quantitative interpretation of optical and transport measurements performed in magnetic fields. In addition the measured g-factors are valuable input parameters for optimizing band structure calculations of these 2D materials.
The formation of interfacial moire patterns from angular and/or lattice mismatch has become a powerful approach to engineer a range of quantum phenomena in van der Waals heterostructures. For long-lived and valley-polarized interlayer excitons in transition-metal dichalcogenide (TMDC) heterobilayers, signatures of quantum confinement by the moire landscape have been reported in recent experimental studies. Such moire confinement has offered the exciting possibility to tailor new excitonic systems, such as ordered arrays of zero-dimensional (0D) quantum emitters and their coupling into topological superlattices. A remarkable nature of the moire potential is its dramatic response to strain, where a small uniaxial strain can tune the array of quantum-dot-like 0D traps into parallel stripes of one-dimensional (1D) quantum wires. Here, we present direct evidence for the 1D moire potentials from real space imaging and the corresponding 1D moire excitons from photoluminescence (PL) emission in MoSe2/WSe2 heterobilayers. Whereas the 0D moire excitons display quantum emitter-like sharp PL peaks with circular polarization, the PL emission from 1D moire excitons has linear polarization and two orders of magnitude higher intensity. The results presented here establish strain engineering as a powerful new method to tailor moire potentials as well as their optical and electronic responses on demand.
By using first-principles calculation, we have found that a family of 2D transition metal dichalcogenide haeckelites with square-octagonal lattice $MX_2$-4-8 ($M$=Mo, W and $X$=S, Se and Te) can host quantum spin hall effect. The phonon spectra indicate that they are dynamically stable and the largest band gap is predicted to be around 54 meV, higher than room temperature. These will pave the way to potential applications of topological insulators. We have also established a simple tight-binding model on a square-like lattice to achieve topological nontrivial quantum states, which extends the study from honeycomb lattice to square-like lattice and broads the potential topological material system greatly.
Recently, the celebrated Keldysh potential has been widely used to describe the Coulomb interaction of few-body complexes in monolayer transition-metal dichalcogenides. Using this potential to model charged excitons (trions), one finds a strong dependence of the binding energy on whether the monolayer is suspended in air, supported on SiO$_2$, or encapsulated in hexagonal boron-nitride. However, empirical values of the trion binding energies show weak dependence on the monolayer configuration. This deficiency indicates that the description of the Coulomb potential is still lacking in this important class of materials. We address this problem and derive a new potential form, which takes into account the three atomic sheets that compose a monolayer of transition-metal dichalcogenides. The new potential self-consistently supports (i) the non-hydrogenic Rydberg series of neutral excitons, and (ii) the weak dependence of the trion binding energy on the environment. Furthermore, we identify an important trion-lattice coupling due to the phonon cloud in the vicinity of charged complexes. Neutral excitons, on the other hand, have weaker coupling to the lattice due to the confluence of their charge neutrality and small Bohr radius.