Monolayer Semiconductor Auger Detector

Colin Ming Earn Chow; Hongyi Yu; John R. Schaibley; Pasqual Rivera; Joseph Finney; Jiaqiang Yan; David Mandrus; Takashi Taniguchi; Kenji Watanabe; Wang Yao; David Henry Cobden; Xiaodong Xu

doi:10.1021/acs.nanolett.0c02190

Monolayer Semiconductor Auger Detector

Colin Ming Earn Chow
, Hongyi Yu
, John R. Schaibley
, Pasqual Rivera
, Joseph Finney
, Jiaqiang Yan
, David Mandrus
, Takashi Taniguchi
, Kenji Watanabe
, Wang Yao
, David Henry Cobden
, Xiaodong Xu

Correlated Electron Materials

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

12 Scopus citations

Abstract

Auger recombination in semiconductors is a many-body phenomenon in which the recombination of electrons and holes is accompanied by excitation of other charge carriers. The excess energy of the excited carriers is normally rapidly converted to heat, making Auger processes difficult to probe directly. Here, we employ a technique in which the Auger-excited carriers are detected by their ability to tunnel out of the semiconductor through a thin barrier, generating a current. We use vertical van der Waals heterostructures with monolayer WSe2 as the semiconductor, with hexagonal boron nitride as the tunnel barrier, and a graphite collector electrode. The Auger processes combined with resonant absorption produce characteristic negative photoconductance. We detect holes Auger-excited by both neutral and charged excitons and find that the Auger scattering is surprisingly strong under weak excitation. Our work expands the range of techniques available for probing relaxation processes in 2D materials.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	5538-5543
Number of pages	6
Journal	Nano Letters
Volume	20
Issue number	7
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.nanolett.0c02190
State	Published - Jul 8 2020

Funding

This work was mainly supported by AFOSR FA9550-18-1-0104 and FA9550-18-1-0046 and partially supported by NSF EFRI (Grant No. 1741656). The initial measurement was supported by DoE BES (DE-SC0018171) through J.R.S. W.Y. and H.Y. were supported by the Croucher Foundation (Croucher Innovation Award), the RGC of Hong Kong (HKU17305914P), and the HKU ORA. D.M. and J.Y. were supported by DoE BES, Materials Sciences and Engineering Division. K.W. and T.T. acknowledge support from the Elemental Strategy Initiative conducted by the MEXT, Japan, and the CREST (JPMJCR15F3), JST. X.X. acknowledges support from the State of Washington through Clean Energy Institute and from the Boeing Distinguished Professorship in Physics.

Keywords

Auger photocurrent
exciton-hole Auger scattering
tunneling barrier
van der Waals heterostructure
weak excitation

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10.1021/acs.nanolett.0c02190

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title = "Monolayer Semiconductor Auger Detector",

abstract = "Auger recombination in semiconductors is a many-body phenomenon in which the recombination of electrons and holes is accompanied by excitation of other charge carriers. The excess energy of the excited carriers is normally rapidly converted to heat, making Auger processes difficult to probe directly. Here, we employ a technique in which the Auger-excited carriers are detected by their ability to tunnel out of the semiconductor through a thin barrier, generating a current. We use vertical van der Waals heterostructures with monolayer WSe2 as the semiconductor, with hexagonal boron nitride as the tunnel barrier, and a graphite collector electrode. The Auger processes combined with resonant absorption produce characteristic negative photoconductance. We detect holes Auger-excited by both neutral and charged excitons and find that the Auger scattering is surprisingly strong under weak excitation. Our work expands the range of techniques available for probing relaxation processes in 2D materials.",

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AU - Chow, Colin Ming Earn

AU - Yu, Hongyi

AU - Schaibley, John R.

AU - Rivera, Pasqual

AU - Finney, Joseph

AU - Yan, Jiaqiang

AU - Mandrus, David

AU - Taniguchi, Takashi

AU - Watanabe, Kenji

AU - Yao, Wang

AU - Cobden, David Henry

AU - Xu, Xiaodong

PY - 2020/7/8

Y1 - 2020/7/8

N2 - Auger recombination in semiconductors is a many-body phenomenon in which the recombination of electrons and holes is accompanied by excitation of other charge carriers. The excess energy of the excited carriers is normally rapidly converted to heat, making Auger processes difficult to probe directly. Here, we employ a technique in which the Auger-excited carriers are detected by their ability to tunnel out of the semiconductor through a thin barrier, generating a current. We use vertical van der Waals heterostructures with monolayer WSe2 as the semiconductor, with hexagonal boron nitride as the tunnel barrier, and a graphite collector electrode. The Auger processes combined with resonant absorption produce characteristic negative photoconductance. We detect holes Auger-excited by both neutral and charged excitons and find that the Auger scattering is surprisingly strong under weak excitation. Our work expands the range of techniques available for probing relaxation processes in 2D materials.

AB - Auger recombination in semiconductors is a many-body phenomenon in which the recombination of electrons and holes is accompanied by excitation of other charge carriers. The excess energy of the excited carriers is normally rapidly converted to heat, making Auger processes difficult to probe directly. Here, we employ a technique in which the Auger-excited carriers are detected by their ability to tunnel out of the semiconductor through a thin barrier, generating a current. We use vertical van der Waals heterostructures with monolayer WSe2 as the semiconductor, with hexagonal boron nitride as the tunnel barrier, and a graphite collector electrode. The Auger processes combined with resonant absorption produce characteristic negative photoconductance. We detect holes Auger-excited by both neutral and charged excitons and find that the Auger scattering is surprisingly strong under weak excitation. Our work expands the range of techniques available for probing relaxation processes in 2D materials.

KW - Auger photocurrent

KW - exciton-hole Auger scattering

KW - tunneling barrier

KW - van der Waals heterostructure

KW - weak excitation

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VL - 20

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JO - Nano Letters

JF - Nano Letters

IS - 7

ER -

Monolayer Semiconductor Auger Detector

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