Stacks of atomically thin semiconducting transition metal dichalcogenides offer exciting opportunities for the study of new optical phenomena. In 2019, a number of studies uncovered many aspects of the underlying physics that can be understood in terms of well-known, but also new, exotic, types of exciton.
Key advances
Excitons in transition metal dichalcogenide heterostructures form a Bose–Einstein condensate at unusually high temperatures.
In large-period moiré superlattices, interlayer excitons are trapped and may emit circularly polarized single photons.
In small-period moiré superlattices, normally dark excitonic states can emit light.
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Change history
10 January 2020
The Competing interest statement is added as it was missing from the previous version.
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Tartakovskii, A. Excitons in 2D heterostructures. Nat Rev Phys 2, 8–9 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-019-0136-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-019-0136-1
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