Article Exciton-assisted electron tunnelling in van der Waals heterostructures

Lujun Wang ; Sotirios Papadopoulos ; Fadil Iyikanat ; Jian Zhang ; Jing Huang ; Takashi Taniguchi SAMURAI ORCID (National Institute for Materials ScienceROR) ; Kenji Watanabe SAMURAI ORCID (National Institute for Materials ScienceROR) ; Michel Calame ; Mickael L. Perrin ; F. Javier García de Abajo ; Lukas Novotny

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Lujun Wang, Sotirios Papadopoulos, Fadil Iyikanat, Jian Zhang, Jing Huang, Takashi Taniguchi, Kenji Watanabe, Michel Calame, Mickael L. Perrin, F. Javier García de Abajo, Lukas Novotny. Exciton-assisted electron tunnelling in van der Waals heterostructures. Nature Materials. 2023, 22 (9), 1094-1099. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-023-01556-7
SAMURAI

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(abstract)

The control of elastic and inelastic electron tunneling relies on materials with well defined interfaces. Van der Waals materials made of two-dimensional constituents form an ideal platform for such studies. Signatures of acoustic phonons and defect states have been observed in current-to-voltage (I–V ) measurements. These features can be explained by direct electron-phonon or electron-defect interactions. Here we demonstrate a novel two-step tunneling process, involving both phonons and excitons. We use tunnel junctions consisting of graphene and gold electrodes separated by hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) barriers with adjacent transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) monolayers and observe prominent resonant features in I–V measurements. These resonances appear at bias voltages that correspond to TMD exciton energies and are accompanied by excitonic light emission. By placing the TMD outside of the tunneling pathway we demonstrate that this phonon-exciton mediated tunneling process does not require any charge injection into the TMD. This work demonstrates the appearance of optical modes in electrical transport measurements and introduces a new functionality for optoelectronic devices based on van der Waals materials.

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Keyword: Elastic and inelastic electron tunnelling, van der Waals materials, tunnelling process

Date published: 2023-06-26

Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC

Journal:

  • Nature Materials (ISSN: 14764660) vol. 22 issue. 9 p. 1094-1099

Funding:

  • Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung 200020_192362
  • Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung PCEFP2_203663
  • Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung 189924 (Hydronics)
  • MEXT | Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI 19H0579019H05790, 20H00354 and 21H05233
  • MEXT | Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI 19H0579019H05790, 20H00354 and 21H05233
  • Generalitat de Catalunya CERCA and AGAUR

Manuscript type: Publisher's version (Version of record)

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First published URL: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-023-01556-7

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Updated at: 2025-02-28 08:30:51 +0900

Published on MDR: 2025-02-28 08:30:51 +0900

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