Evidence for line width and carrier screening effects on excitonic valley relaxation in 2D semiconductors

• Published in: Nature communications Vol. 9; no. 1; pp. 2598 - 10
• Main Authors: Miyauchi, Yuhei, Konabe, Satoru, Wang, Feijiu, Zhang, Wenjin, Hwang, Alexander, Hasegawa, Yusuke, Zhou, Lizhong, Mouri, Shinichiro, Toh, Minglin, Eda, Goki, Matsuda, Kazunari
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 03.07.2018; Nature Publishing Group; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 140/125; 639/301/119/1000/1018; 639/925/357/1018; Carrier density; Electronics industry; Excitons; Genetic screening; Graphene; Humanities and Social Sciences; Monolayers; multidisciplinary; Photoluminescence; Photons; Physics; Polarization; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Screening; Semiconductors; Spectroscopy; Temperature; Temperature dependence; Valleys
• ISSN: 2041-1723; 2041-1723
• DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-04988-x

Monolayers of transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDC) have recently emerged as excellent platforms for exploiting new physics and applications relying on electronic valley degrees of freedom in two-dimensional (2D) systems. Here, we demonstrate that Coulomb screening by 2D carriers plays a critical role in excitonic valley pseudospin relaxation processes in naturally carrier-doped WSe 2 monolayers (1L-WSe 2 ). The exciton valley relaxation times were examined using polarization- and time-resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy at temperatures ranging from 10 to 160 K. We show that the temperature-dependent exciton valley relaxation times in 1L-WSe 2 under various exciton and carrier densities can be understood using a unified framework of intervalley exciton scattering via momentum-dependent long-range electron–hole exchange interactions screened by 2D carriers that depend on the carrier density and the exciton linewidth. Moreover, the developed framework was successfully applied to engineer the valley polarization of excitons in 1L-WSe 2 . These findings may facilitate the development of TMDC-based opto-valleytronic devices. Atomically thin transition metal dichalcogenides offer a platform to explore the valley degree of freedom originating from their electronic band structure. Here, the authors use polarization- and time-resolved spectroscopy to investigate the temperature-dependent valley pseudospin relaxation processes in WSe 2 monolayers.