Inverse funnel effect of excitons in strained black phosphorus

We study the effects of strain on the properties and dynamics of Wannier excitons in monolayer (phosphorene) and few-layer black phosphorus (BP), a promising two-dimensional material for optoelectronic applications due to its high mobility, mechanical strength, and strain-tunable direct band gap. We...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: San-José, Pablo, Parente, Vincenzo, Guinea, Francisco, Roldán, Rafael, Prada, Elsa
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2016
País:España
Institución:Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)
Repositorio:DIGITAL.CSIC. Repositorio Institucional del CSIC
OAI Identifier:oai:digital.csic.es:10261/186975
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10261/186975
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Condensed Matter Physics
Optoelectronics
Descripción
Sumario:We study the effects of strain on the properties and dynamics of Wannier excitons in monolayer (phosphorene) and few-layer black phosphorus (BP), a promising two-dimensional material for optoelectronic applications due to its high mobility, mechanical strength, and strain-tunable direct band gap. We compare the results to the case of molybdenum disulphide (MoS) monolayers. We find that the so-called funnel effect, i.e., the possibility of controlling exciton motion by means of inhomogeneous strains, is much stronger in few-layer BP than in MoS monolayers and, crucially, is of opposite sign. Instead of excitons accumulating isotropically around regions of high tensile strain like in MoS, excitons in BP are pushed away from said regions. This inverse funnel effect is moreover highly anisotropic, with much larger funnel distances along the armchair crystallographic direction, leading to a directional focusing of exciton flow. A strong inverse funnel effect could enable simpler designs of funnel solar cells and offer new possibilities for the manipulation and harvesting of light.