Researchers have discovered a way to maintain special quantum characteristics in 3D materials using magnetic confinement. This breakthrough has potential applications in optical systems and advanced computing.
Physicists have developed a novel approach to maintain special quantum characteristics, even in 3D materials, with potential applications in optical systems and advanced computing. There is a big problem with quantum technology -- it's tiny.
The distinctive properties that exist at the subatomic scale usually disappear at macroscopic scales, making it difficult to harness their superior sensing and communication capabilities for real-world applications, like optical systems and advanced computing. Now, however, an international team led by physicists at Penn State and Columbia University has developed a novel approach to maintain special quantum characteristics, even in three-dimensional (3D) materials. \'Although the functionalities displayed by two dimensional (2D) materials are vast and their potential is revolutionary, maintaining their superior properties beyond the 2D limit remains a formidable challenge,' said first author Yinming Shao, assistant professor of physics at Penn State, explaining that such materials are typically crystals that are only one atom thick and can be applied in a variety of fashions, including for flexible electronics, energy storage and quantum technologies.'Realization, understanding and control of nanoscale confinement are, thus, crucial for both exploration of quantum physics and future quantum technologies.' The team examined quasiparticles known as excitons, which have unique optical properties and can carry energy without an electrical charge, in a semiconductor material. Semiconductors -- which are ubiquitous across computers, phones and other electronics -- conduct electricity under certain conditions and inhibit it under others. Excitons are produced when light hits a semiconductor, energizing an electron to jump to the next energy level. The resulting excited electron and the hole it left are jointly referred to as an exciton. Excitons occur homogenously across typical 3D semiconductors, like silicon. 'But the binding energy for the excitons in bulk materials like silicon is usually small, meaning it's not very stable and it's not easy to observe,' Shao said, explaining that excitons are most stable and exhibit superior properties only in 2D monolayers. \The conventional method for preparing 2D materials was developed in 2004 and led to the discovery of graphene, the single layer of carbon that is highly conductive and stronger than steel. The process is simple, but labor intensive, as each layer must be exfoliated from a bulk crystal by applying a piece of sticky tape and peeling it off. In this thin, 2D state, excitons can carry energy without charge, as well as emit light when its electron and hole recombine, which Shao said is useful for advanced optical applications. To preserve those properties in materials large enough for such applications, however, researchers would need to produce a huge number of layers. To do this without peeling and stacking each layer by hand, the researchers turned to another aspect of physics: magnetism. Specifically, they focused on chromium sulfide bromide (CrSBr), a layered magnetic semiconductor that co-author Xavier Roy, professor of chemistry at Columbia University, has researched extensively and further developed since 2020. At room temperature, CrSBr acts as a normal semiconductor just like silicon. Cooling CrSBr down, to around -223 degrees Fahrenheit, brings it to a ground state, or the state of lowest energy. This transforms it into an antiferromagnetic system, in which the magnetic moments -- usually referred to as'spin' -- of the system's particles align in a regular, repeating pattern. Specifically for CrSBr, this antiferromagnetic ordering ensures that each layer alternates its magnetic alignment, effectively canceling out a magnetic moment and rendering the material insensitive to external magnetic forces. As a result, excitons tend to stay in the layer with the same spin, rather than hooping to the neighboring layers with the opposite spins. Like cars on alternating one-way streets, these established boundaries keep excitons confined to the layer with which they share the same spin directions. 'This is an effective approach to create a single layer of atomic material without exfoliating it out, while still preserving a sharp interface,' Shao said.'This means we could achieve the same behavior of confined excitons demonstrated in 2D materials in a bulk material.' Using optical spectroscopy techniques, theoretical modeling and calculation, the researchers determined that this magnetic confinement held firm no matter how many layers were in the system and no matter which layer they confined, including surface layers. Shao's team's finding was corroborated by another research group out of Germany -- Florian Dirnberger and Alexey Chernikov from TUD Dresden University of Technology -- who were investigating the same quirk of magnetic semiconductors
Quantum Technology Excitons Magnetism Semiconductors 3D Materials
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