We demonstrate a new approach for dynamically manipulating the optical response of an atomically thin semiconductor, a monolayer of MoSe2, by suspending it over a metallic mirror. First, we show that suspended van der Waals heterostructures incorporating a MoSe2 monolayer host spatially homogeneous, lifetime-broadened excitons. Then, we interface this nearly ideal excitonic system with a metallic mirror and demonstrate control over the exciton-photon coupling. Specifically, by electromechanically changing the distance between the heterostructure and the mirror, thereby changing the local photonic density of states in a controllable and reversible fashion, we show that both the absorption and emission properties of the excitons can be dynamically modulated. This electromechanical control over exciton dynamics in a mechanically flexible, atomically thin semiconductor opens up new avenues in cavity quantum optomechanics, nonlinear quantum optics, and topological photonics.
@article{arxiv.1901.08500,
title = {Controlling excitons in an atomically thin membrane with a mirror},
author = {You Zhou and Giovanni Scuri and Jiho Sung and Ryan J. Gelly and Dominik S. Wild and Kristiaan De Greve and Andrew Y. Joe and Takashi Taniguchi and Kenji Watanabe and Philip Kim and Mikhail D. Lukin and Hongkun Park},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1901.08500},
year = {2020}
}