arXiv subjects

Hanyu Zhu

Publications and source records attributed to Hanyu Zhu.

33 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2023

Large effective magnetic fields from chiral phonons in rare-earth halides

Time-reversal symmetry (TRS) is pivotal for materials optical, magnetic, topological, and transport properties. Chiral phonons, characterized by atoms rotating unidirectionally around their equilibrium positions, generate dynamic lattice structures that break TRS. Here we report that coherent chiral phonons, driven by circularly polarized terahertz light pulses, can polarize the paramagnetic spins in CeF3 like a quasi-static magnetic field on the order of 1 Tesla. Through time-resolved Faraday rotation and Kerr ellipticity, we found the transient magnetization is only excited by pulses resonant with phonons, proportional to the angular momentum of the phonons, and growing with magnetic susceptibility at cryogenic temperatures, as expected from the spin-phonon coupling model. The time-dependent effective magnetic field quantitatively agrees with that calculated from phonon dynamics. Our results may open a new route to directly investigate mode-specific spin-phonon interaction in ultrafast magnetism, energy-efficient spintronics, and non-equilibrium phases of matter with broken TRS.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2023

Phase Stability of Hexagonal/cubic Boron Nitride Nanocomposites

Boron nitride (BN) is an exceptional material and among its polymorphs, two-dimensional (2D) hexagonal and three-dimensional (3D) cubic BN (h-BN and c-BN) phases are most common. The phase stability regimes of these BN phases are still under debate and phase transformations of h-BN/c-BN remain a topic of interest. Here, we investigate the phase stability of 2D/3D h-BN/c-BN nanocomposites and show that the co-existence of two phases can lead to strong non-linear optical properties and low thermal conductivity at room temperature. Furthermore, spark-plasma sintering of the nanocomposite shows complete phase transformation to 2D h-BN with improved crystalline quality, where 3D c-BN grain sizes governs the nucleation and growth kinetics. Our demonstration might be insightful in phase engineering of BN polymorphs based nanocomposites with desirable properties for optoelectronics and thermal energy management applications.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2022

Properties and device performance of BN thin films grown on GaN by pulsed laser deposition

Wide and ultrawide-bandgap semiconductors lie at the heart of next-generation high-power, high-frequency electronics. Here, we report the growth of ultrawide-bandgap boron nitride (BN) thin films on wide-bandgap gallium nitride (GaN) by pulsed laser deposition. Comprehensive spectroscopic (core level and valence band XPS, FTIR, Raman) and microscopic (AFM and STEM) characterizations confirm the growth of BN thin films on GaN. Optically, we observed that BN/GaN heterostructure is second-harmonic generation active. Moreover, we fabricated the BN/GaN heterostructure-based Schottky diode that demonstrates rectifying characteristics, lower turn-on voltage, and an improved breakdown capability (234 V) as compared to GaN (168 V), owing to the higher breakdown electrical field of BN. Our approach is an early step towards bridging the gap between wide and ultrawide-bandgap materials for potential optoelectronics as well as next-generation high-power electronics.

physics.app-ph↗

arXiv2021

Scalable synthesis of 2D van der Waals superlattices

Heterostructure materials form the basis of much of modern electronics, from transistors to lasers and light-emitting diodes. Recent years have seen a renewed focus on creating heterostructures through the vertical integration of two-dimensional materials, including graphene, hexagonal boron nitride, and transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs). However, fundamental challenges associated with materials processing have limited material quality and impeded scalability. We demonstrate a method to convert sub-nanometer metal films deposited on silicon and sapphire into TMDC heterostructures through vapor-phase processing. The resulting heterostructures and superlattices exhibit novel properties compared with stand-alone TMDCs, including reduced bandgap, enhanced light-matter coupling, and improved catalytic performance. This robust and scalable synthetic method provides new opportunities to generate a wide range of artificially stacked 2D superlattices with controlled morphology and composition.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2021

Processing Dynamics of 3D-Printed Carbon Nanotubes-Epoxy Composites

Carbon Nanotubes (CNTs)-polymer composites are promising candidates for a myriad of applications. Ad-hoc CNTs-polymer composite fabrication techniques inherently pose roadblock to optimized processing resulting in microstructural defects i.e., void formation, poor interfacial adhesion, wettability, and agglomeration of CNTs inside the polymer matrix. Although improvement in the microstructures can be achieved via additional processing steps such as-mechanical methods and/or chemical functionalization, the resulting composites are somewhat limited in structural and functional performances. Here, we demonstrate that 3D printing technique like-direct ink writing offers improved processing of CNTs-polymer composites. The shear-induced flow of an engineered nanocomposite ink through the micronozzle offers some benefits including reducing the number of voids within the epoxy, improving CNTs dispersion and adhesion with epoxy, and partially aligns the CNTs. Such microstructural changes result in superior mechanical performance and heat transfer in the composites compared to their mold-casted counterparts. This work demonstrates the advantages of 3D printing over traditional fabrication methods, beyond the ability to rapidly fabricate complex architectures, to achieve improved processing dynamics for fabricating CNT-polymer nanocomposites with better structural and functional properties.

physics.app-ph↗

arXiv2018

Interconnection Strategies for Self-Calibration of Large Scale Antenna Arrays

In time-division duplexing (TDD) systems, massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) relies on the channel reciprocity to obtain the downlink (DL) channel state information (CSI) with the uplink (UL) CSI. In practice, the mismatches in the radio frequency (RF) analog circuits among different antennas at the base station (BS) break the end-to-end UL and DL channel reciprocity. Antenna calibration is necessary to avoid the severe performance degradation with massive MIMO. Many calibration schemes are available to compensate the RF gain mismatches and restore the channel reciprocity in TDD massive MIMO systems. In this paper, we focus on the internal self-calibration scheme where different BS antennas are interconnected via hardware transmission lines. First, we study the resulting calibration performance for an arbitrary interconnection strategy. Next, we obtain closed-form Cramer-Rao lower bound (CRLB) expressions for each interconnection strategy at the BS with only (M-1) transmission lines and M denotes the total number of BS antennas. Basing on the derived results, we further prove that the star interconnection strategy is optimal for internal self-calibration due to its lowest CRLB. In addition, we also put forward efficient recursive algorithms to derive the corresponding maximum-likelihood (ML) estimates of all the calibration coefficients. Numerical simulation results are also included to corroborate our theoretical analyses and results.

eess.SP↗

arXiv2018

How to interconnect for Massive MIMO Self-Calibration?

In time-division duplexing (TDD) systems, massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) relies on the channel reciprocity to obtain the downlink (DL) channel state information (CSI) with the acquired uplink (UL) CSI at the base station (BS). However, the mismatches in the radio frequency (RF) analog circuits at different antennas at the BS break the end-to-end UL and DL channel reciprocity. To restore the channel reciprocity, it is necessary to calibrate all the antennas at the BS. This paper addresses the interconnection strategy for the internal self-calibration at the BS where different antennas are interconnected via hardware transmission lines. Specifically, the paper reveals the optimality of the star interconnection and the daisy chain interconnection respectively. From the results, we see the star interconnection is the optimal interconnection strategy when the BS are given the same number of measurements. On the other hand, the daisy chain interconnection outperforms the star interconnection when the same amount of time resources are consumed. Numerical results corroborate our theoretical analyses.

eess.SP↗

arXiv2017

Non Volatile MoS$_{2}$ Field Effect Transistors Directly Gated By Single Crystalline Epitaxial Ferroelectric

We demonstrate non-volatile, n-type, back-gated, MoS$_{2}$ transistors, placed directly on an epitaxial grown, single crystalline, PbZr$_{0.2}$Ti$_{0.8}$O$_{3}$ (PZT) ferroelectric. The transistors show decent ON current (19 $μA/μ$m), high on-off ratio (10$^{7}$), and a subthreshold swing of (SS ~ 92 mV/dec) with a 100 nm thick PZT layer as the back gate oxide. Importantly, the ferroelectric polarization can directly control the channel charge, showing a clear anti-clockwise hysteresis. We have selfconsistently confirmed the switching of the ferroelectric and corresponding change in channel current from a direct time-dependent measurement. Our results demonstrate that it is possible to obtain transistor operation directly on polar surfaces and therefore it should be possible to integrate 2D electronics with single crystalline functional oxides.

physics.app-ph↗

arXiv2016

High Thermoelectric Powerfactor in Single and Few-Layer MoS$_2$

The quest for high-efficiency heat-to-electricity conversion has been one of the major driving forces towards renewable energy production for the future. Efficient thermoelectric devices require high voltage generation from a temperature gradient and a large electrical conductivity, while maintaining a low thermal conductivity. For a given thermal conductivity and temperature, the thermoelectric powerfactor is determined by the electronic structure of the material. Low dimensionality (1D and 2D) opens new routes to high powerfactor due to the unique density of states (DOS) of confined electrons and holes. 2D transition metal dichalcogenide (TMDC) semiconductors represent a new class of thermoelectric materials not only due to such confinement effects, but especially due to their large effective masses and valley degeneracies. Here we report a powerfactor of $MoS_2$ as large as $8.5 mWm^{-1}K^{-2}$ at room temperature, which is amongst the highest measured in traditional, gapped thermoelectric materials. To obtain these high powerfactors, we perform thermoelectric measurements on few-layer $MoS_2$ in the metallic regime, which allows us to access the 2D DOS near the conduction band edge and exploit the effect of 2D confinement on electron scattering rates, which result in a large Seebeck coefficient. The demonstrated high, electronically modulated powerfactor in 2D TMDCs holds promise for efficient thermoelectric energy conversion.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2015

Chemical assembly of atomically thin transistors and circuits in a large scale

Next-generation electronics calls for new materials beyond silicon for increased functionality, performance, and scaling in integrated circuits. Carbon nanotubes and semiconductor nanowires are at the forefront of these materials, but have challenges due to the complex fabrication techniques required for large-scale applications. Two-dimensional (2D) gapless graphene and semiconducting transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs) have emerged as promising electronic materials due to their atomic thickness, chemical stability and scalability. Difficulties in the assembly of 2D electronic structures arise in the precise spatial control over the metallic and semiconducting atomic thin films. Ultimately, this impedes the maturity of integrating atomic elements in modern electronics. Here, we report the large-scale spatially controlled synthesis of the single-layer semiconductor molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) laterally in contact with conductive graphene. Transition electron microscope (TEM) studies reveal that the single-layer MoS2 nucleates at the edge of the graphene, creating a lateral 2D heterostructure. We demonstrate such chemically assembled 2D atomic transistors exhibit high transconductance (10 uS), on-off ratios (10^6), and mobility (20 cm^2 V^-1 s^-1). We assemble 2D logic circuits, such as a heterostructure NMOS inverter with a high voltage gain, up to 70, enabled by the precise site selectivity from atomically thin conducting and semiconducting crystals. This scalable chemical assembly of 2D heterostructures may usher in a new era in two-dimensional electronic circuitry and computing.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2015

Optical Selection Rule based on Valley-Exciton Locking for 2D Valleytronics

Optical selection rule fundamentally determines the optical transition between energy states in a variety of physical systems from hydrogen atoms to bulk crystals such as GaAs. It is important for optoelectronic applications such as lasers, energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and quantum computation. Recently, single layer transition metal dichalcogenide (TMDC) exhibits valleys in momentum space with nontrivial Berry curvature and excitons with large binding energy. However, it is unclear how the unique valley degree of freedom combined with the strong excitonic effect influences the optical excitation. Here we discover a new set of optical selection rules in monolayer WS2,imposed by valley and exciton angular momentum. We experimentally demonstrated such a principle for second harmonic generation (SHG) and two-photon luminescence (TPL). Moreover, the two-photon induced valley populations yield net circular polarized photoluminescence after a sub-ps interexciton relaxation (2p->1s) and last for 8 ps. The discovery of this new optical selection rule in valleytronic 2D system not only largely extend information degrees but sets a foundation in control of optical transitions that is crucial to valley optoeletronic device applications such as 2D valley-polarized light emitting diodes (LED), optical switches and coherent control for quantum computing.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2015

Monolayer Excitonic Laser

Recently, two-dimensional (2D) materials have opened a new paradigm for fundamental physics explorations and device applications. Unlike gapless graphene, monolayer transition metal dichalcogenide (TMDC) has new optical functionalities for next generation ultra-compact electronic and opto-electronic devices. When TMDC crystals are thinned down to monolayers, they undergo an indirect to direct bandgap transition, making it an outstanding 2D semiconductor. Unique electron valley degree of freedom, strong light matter interactions and excitonic effects were observed. Enhancement of spontaneous emission has been reported on TMDC monolayers integrated with photonic crystal and distributed Bragg reflector microcavities. However, the coherent light emission from 2D monolayer TMDC has not been demonstrated, mainly due to that an atomic membrane has limited material gain volume and is lack of optical mode confinement. Here, we report the first realization of 2D excitonic laser by embedding monolayer tungsten disulfide (WS2) in a microdisk resonator. Using a whispering gallery mode (WGM) resonator with a high quality factor and optical confinement, we observed bright excitonic lasing in visible wavelength. The Si3N4/WS2/HSQ sandwich configuration provides a strong feedback and mode overlap with monolayer gain. This demonstration of 2D excitonic laser marks a major step towards 2D on-chip optoelectronics for high performance optical communication and computing applications.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2014

Observation of Piezoelectricity in Monolayer Molybdenum Disulfide

Piezoelectricity offers precise and robust conversion between electricity and mechanical force. Here we report the first experimental evidence of piezoelectricity in a single layer of molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) crystal as a result of inversion symmetry breaking of the atomic structure, with measured piezoelectric coefficient e11 = 2.9e-10 C/m. Through the angular dependence of electro-mechanical coupling, we uniquely determined the two-dimensional (2D) crystal orientation. We observed that only MoS2 membranes with odd number of layers exhibited piezoelectricity, in sharp contrast to the conventional materials. The piezoelectricity discovered in single molecular membrane promises scaling down of nano-electro-mechanical systems (NEMS) to single atomic unit cell - the ultimate material limit.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2014

Probing Excitonic Dark States in Single-layer Tungsten Disulfide

Transition metal dichalcogenide (TMDC) monolayer has recently emerged as an important two-dimensional semiconductor with promising potentials for electronic and optoelectronic devices. Unlike semi-metallic graphene, layered TMDC has a sizable band gap. More interestingly, when thinned down to a monolayer, TMDC transforms from an indirect bandgap to a direct bandgap semiconductor, exhibiting a number of intriguing optical phenomena such as valley selective circular dichroism, doping dependent charged excitons, and strong photocurrent responses. However, the fundamental mechanism underlying such a strong light-matter interaction is still under intensive investigation. The observed optical resonance was initially considered to be band-to-band transitions. In contrast, first-principle calculations predicted a much larger quasiparticle band gap size and an optical response that is dominated by excitonic effects. Here, we report experimental evidence of the exciton dominance mechanism by discovering a series of excitonic dark states in single-layer WS2 using two-photon excitation spectroscopy. In combination with GW-BSE theory, we find the excitons are Wannier excitons in nature but possess extraordinarily large binding energy (~0.7 eV), leading to a quasiparticle band gap of 2.7 eV. These strongly bound exciton states are observed stable even at room temperature. We reveal an exciton series in significant deviation from hydrogen models, with a novel inverse energy dependence on the orbital angular momentum. These excitonic energy levels are experimentally found robust against environmental perturbations. The discovery of excitonic dark states and exceptionally large binding energy not only sheds light on the importance of many-electron effects in this two-dimensional gapped system, but also holds exciting potentials for the device application of TMDC monolayers and their heterostructures.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2013

Exciton-related electroluminescence from monolayer MoS2

Excitons in MoS2 dominate the absorption and emission properties of the two-dimensional system. Here, we study the microscopic origin of the electroluminescence from monolayer MoS2 fabricated on a heavily p-type doped silicon substrate. By comparing the photoluminescence and electroluminescence of a MoS2 diode, direct-exciton and bound-exciton related recombination processes can be identified. Auger recombination of the exciton-exciton annihilation of bound exciton emission is observed under a high electron-hole pair injection rate at room temperature. We expect the direct exciton-exciton annihilation lifetime to exceed the carrier lifetime, due to the absence of any noticeable direct exciton saturation. We believe that our method of electrical injection opens a new route to understand the microscopic nature of the exciton recombination and facilitate the control of valley and spin excitation in MoS2.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗