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Results for “Laser-illumination”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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Unveiling defect-mediated carrier dynamics in monolayer semiconductors by spatiotemporal microwave imaging

The optoelectronic properties of atomically thin transition-metal dichalcogenides are strongly correlated with the presence of defects in the materials, which are not necessarily detrimental for certain applications. For instance, defects can lead to an enhanced photoconduction, a complicated process involving charge generation and recombination in the time domain and carrier transport in the spatial domain. Here, we report the simultaneous spatial and temporal photoconductivity imaging in two types of WS 2 monolayers by laser-illuminated microwave impedance microscopy. The diffusion length and carrier lifetime were directly extracted from the spatial profile and temporal relaxation of microwave signals, respectively. Time-resolved experiments indicate that the critical process for photoexcited carriers is the escape of holes from trap states, which prolongs the apparent lifetime of mobile electrons in the conduction band. As a result, counterintuitively, the long-lived photoconductivity signal is higher in chemical-vapor deposited (CVD) samples than exfoliated monolayers due to the presence of traps that inhibits recombination. Overall, our work reveals the intrinsic time and length scales of electrical response to photoexcitation in van der Waals materials, which is essential for their applications in optoelectronic devices.

42 ENGINEERING↗

All-optical photoluminescence response of nitrogen-vacancy ensembles in diamond at low magnetic fields

All-optical (AO) microwave-free magnetometry using nitrogen-vacancy (N-𝑉) centers in diamond is attractive due to its broad applicability and reduced experimental complexity. In this work, we investigate room-temperature AO photoluminescence (PL) at low magnetic fields ( <2 mT) using diamonds with N-𝑉 ensembles at parts-per-million (ppm) concentrations. The measured AO-PL contrast features as a function of the applied magnetic field magnitude and direction are correlated with near-degenerate N-𝑉 electronic spin and hyperfine transitions from different N-𝑉 orientations within the diamond host. Reasonable agreement is found between low-field AO-PL measurements and model-based simulations of the effects of resonant dipolar interactions between N-𝑉 centers. The maximum observed AO-PL contrast depends on both the N-𝑉 concentration and the laser-illumination intensity at 532 nm. These results imply different optimal conditions for low-field AO N-𝑉 sensing compared to conventional optically detected magnetic resonance (ODMR) techniques, suggesting new research and application opportunities using AO measurements with lower system complexity, size, weight, and power.

Dipolar interaction↗

Atomistic Probing of Defect-Engineered 2H-MoTe 2 Monolayers

Point defects dictate various physical, chemical, and optoelectronic properties of two-dimensional (2D) materials, and therefore, a rudimentary understanding of the formation and spatial distribution of point defects is a key to advancement in 2D material-based nanotechnology. In this work, we performed the demonstration to directly probe the point defects in 2H-MoTe 2 monolayers that are tactically exposed to (i) 200 °C-vacuum-annealing and (ii) 532 nm-laser-illumination; and accordingly, we utilize a deep learning algorithm to classify and quantify the generated point defects. We discovered that tellurium-related defects are mainly generated in both 2H-MoTe 2 samples; but interestingly, 200 °C-vacuum-annealing and 532 nm-laser-illumination modulate a strong n-type and strong p-type 2H-MoTe 2 , respectively. While 200 °C-vacuum-annealing generates tellurium vacancies or tellurium adatoms, 532 nm-laser-illumination prompts oxygen atoms to be adsorbed/chemisorbed at tellurium vacancies, giving rise to the p-type characteristic. This work significantly advances the current understanding of point defect engineering in 2H-MoTe 2 monolayers and other 2D materials, which is critical for developing nanoscale devices with desired functionality.

2H-MoTe 2↗