Professor Robert Taylor

Abstract:

Despite having outstanding electrical properties, graphene is unsuitable for optical devices because of its zero band gap. Here, we report two-dimensional excitonic photoluminescence (PL) from graphene grown on a Cu(111) surface, which shows an unexpected and remarkably sharp strong emission near 3.16 eV (full width at half-maximum ≤3 meV) and multiple emissions around 3.18 eV. As temperature increases, these emissions blue shift, displaying the characteristic negative thermal coefficient of graphene. The observed PL originates from the significantly suppressed dispersion of excited electrons in graphene caused by hybridization of graphene π and Cu d orbitals of the first and second Cu layers at a shifted saddle point 0.525(M+K) of the Brillouin zone. This finding provides a pathway to engineering optoelectronic graphene devices, while maintaining the outstanding electrical properties of graphene.

Abstract:

We report the effect of surfactant addition on the optical properties of perfluorinated polyanilines synthesized through liquid-liquid interfaces. We obtained very long Stokes shifts, 205 nm, for oligomers derived from a hydrofluoroether-water system in the presence of Triton X-100 as a surfactant, and vibronic fine features from a toluene-water system.

Abstract:

Exciton-polaritons are quasiparticles consisting of a linear superposition of photonic and excitonic states, offering potential for nonlinear optical devices. The excitonic component of the polariton provides a finite Coulomb scattering cross section, such that the different types of exciton found in organic materials (Frenkel) and inorganic materials (Wannier-Mott) produce polaritons with different interparticle interaction strength. A hybrid polariton state with distinct excitons provides a potential technological route towards in situ control of nonlinear behaviour. Here we demonstrate a device in which hybrid polaritons are displayed at ambient temperatures, the excitonic component of which is part Frenkel and part Wannier-Mott, and in which the dominant exciton type can be switched with an applied voltage. The device consists of an open microcavity containing both organic dye and a monolayer of the transition metal dichalcogenide WS2. Our findings offer a perspective for electrically controlled nonlinear polariton devices at room temperature.

Abstract:

Generally confinement size is considered to determine the dimensionality of nanostructures. While the exciton Bohr radius is used as a criterion to define either weak or strong confinement in optical experiments, the binding energy of confined excitons is difficult to measure experimentally. One alternative is to use the temperature dependence of the radiative recombination time, which has been employed previously in quantum wells and quantum wires. A one-dimensional loop structure is often assumed to model quantum rings, but this approximation ceases to be valid when the rim width becomes comparable to the ring radius. We have evaluated the density of states in a single quantum ring by measuring the temperature dependence of the radiative recombination of excitons, where the photoluminescence decay time as a function of temperature was calibrated by using the low temperature integrated intensity and linewidth. We conclude that the quasi-continuous finely-spaced levels arising from the rotation energy give rise to a quasi-one-dimensional density of states, as long as the confined exciton is allowed to rotate around the opening of the anisotropic ring structure, which has a finite rim width.