Polarity Tunable Trionic Electroluminescence in Monolayer WSe2

Nano Lett. 2019 Oct 9;19(10):7470-7475. doi: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.9b03215. Epub 2019 Sep 18.

Abstract

Monolayer WSe2 exhibits luminescence arising from various types of exciton complexes due to strong many-body effects. Here, we demonstrate selective electrical excitation of positive and negative trions in van der Waals metal-insulator-semiconductor (MIS) heterostructure consisting of few-layer graphene (FLG), hexagonal boron nitride (hBN), and monolayer WSe2. Intentional unbalanced injection of electrons and holes is achieved via field-emission tunneling and electrostatic accumulation. The device exhibits planar electroluminescence from either positive trion X+ or negative trion X- depending on the bias conditions. We show that hBN serves as a tunneling barrier material allowing selective injection of electron or holes into WSe2 from FLG layer. Our observation offers prospects for hot carrier injection, trion manipulation, and on-chip excitonic devices based on two-dimensional semiconductors.

Keywords: Transition metal dichalcogenides; electroluminescence; field-emission tunneling; trion.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't