Tuning the valley selective excitation and phonon dynamics in tungsten disulfide quantum material

Exotic behavior of electrons in the quantum materials forms the basis for future technologies. In developing optoelectronic and photonic devices with ultrafast electrons an understanding of the interactions at the interfaces of strongly correlated single crystalline quantum materials is a prerequisite. Transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) are Two-dimensional (2D) materials that could be stacked to produce heterostructures. Tungsten disulfide (WS2) as an example of semiconductor 2D TMDs exploits valley degrees of freedom and has strong coulomb and light-matter interactions. The coulomb interactions account for tight excitons in WS2. Excitons interact with phononic states to form exciton-phonon quasiparticles. Understating, microscopically, exciton-phonon bound states are crucial for technological applications in valleytronics, sensors and photonic devices. The goal of this project is to effectively control and manipulate the exciton-phonon dynamics in TMDs with a hot electron generated from resonantly excited surface plasmons and thereby providing further insights in engineering advanced material behaviours.