Vortex-Beam Transient Absorption Microspectroscopy Resolves Ultrafast Free-Exciton and Polaron Diffusion in 2D Perovskites
Two-dimensional (2D) Ruddlesden Popper perovskites are promising optoelectronic materials with strongly confined excitonic properties; however, probing their ultrafast carrier transport dynamics, particularly the initial nonequilibrium diffusion regime, remains challenging because conventional transient absorption microscopy requires complex spatial imaging and lacks sufficient temporal sensitivity to resolve early time diffusion dynamics. Here, we demonstrate a vortex beam based transient absorption microspectroscopy platform (VTAM) enabling imaging free measurement of carrier transport by encoding spatial diffusion information into the mode dependent pump probe signal. By employing vortex probes with different topological charges, VTAM provides mode selective spatial sensitivity to excitonic dynamics with subpicosecond temporal resolution. Using VTAM, we resolved rapid free exciton (FE) diffusion followed by relaxation toward a slower steady state transport regime. A theoretically derived time dependent diffusion model separated transient and steady state transport contributions, yielding a transient diffusion enhancement (68.84 cm2 per s) and a steady state diffusion coefficient (1.85 cm2 per s), thus providing an initial diffusion coefficient (70.69 cm2 per s), and a cooling time of 0.35 ps. Measurements at the exciton-polaron (EP) resonance revealed strongly suppressed diffusion with nearly time independent signal ratios, indicating lattice-coupled EP transport. These parameters were extracted without spatial scanning or image reconstruction, establishing V-TAM as a powerful imaging free platform for investigating carrier transport in perovskites and other semiconductor systems.