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1. How to Recognize the Universal Aspects of Mott Criticality?

   https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst12070932  

   Tan, Yuting; Dobrosavljević, Vladimir; Rademaker, Louk (July 2022, Crystals)

   In this paper we critically discuss several examples of two-dimensional electronic systems displaying interaction-driven metal-insulator transitions of the Mott (or Wigner–Mott) type, including dilute two-dimension electron gases (2DEG) in semiconductors, Mott organic materials, as well as the recently discovered transition-metal dichalcogenide (TMD) moiré bilayers. Remarkably similar behavior is found in all these systems, which is starting to paint a robust picture of Mott criticality. Most notable, on the metallic side a resistivity maximum is observed whose temperature scale vanishes at the transition. We compare the available experimental data on these systems to three existing theoretical scenarios: spinon theory, Dynamical Mean Field Theory (DMFT) and percolation theory. We show that the DMFT and percolation pictures for Mott criticality can be distinguished by studying the origins of the resistivity maxima using an analysis of the dielectric response. 

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2. Quadrupolar excitons and hybridized interlayer Mott insulator in a trilayer moiré superlattice

   https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-40288-9  

   Lian, Zhen; Chen, Dongxue; Ma, Lei; Meng, Yuze; Su, Ying; Yan, Li; Huang, Xiong; Wu, Qiran; Chen, Xinyue; Blei, Mark; et al (December 2023, Nature Communications)

   Abstract Transition metal dichalcogenide (TMDC) moiré superlattices, owing to the moiré flatbands and strong correlation, can host periodic electron crystals and fascinating correlated physics. The TMDC heterojunctions in the type-II alignment also enable long-lived interlayer excitons that are promising for correlated bosonic states, while the interaction is dictated by the asymmetry of the heterojunction. Here we demonstrate a new excitonic state, quadrupolar exciton, in a symmetric WSe 2 -WS 2 -WSe 2 trilayer moiré superlattice. The quadrupolar excitons exhibit a quadratic dependence on the electric field, distinctively different from the linear Stark shift of the dipolar excitons in heterobilayers. This quadrupolar exciton stems from the hybridization of WSe 2 valence moiré flatbands. The same mechanism also gives rise to an interlayer Mott insulator state, in which the two WSe 2 layers share one hole laterally confined in one moiré unit cell. In contrast, the hole occupation probability in each layer can be continuously tuned via an out-of-plane electric field, reaching 100% in the top or bottom WSe 2 under a large electric field, accompanying the transition from quadrupolar excitons to dipolar excitons. Our work demonstrates a trilayer moiré system as a new exciting playground for realizing novel correlated states and engineering quantum phase transitions. 

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3. Low-temperature dielectric anomaly arising from electronic phase separation at the Mott insulator-metal transition

   https://doi.org/10.1038/s41535-020-00307-0  

   Pustogow, A.; Rösslhuber, R.; Tan, Y.; Uykur, E.; Böhme, A.; Wenzel, M.; Saito, Y.; Löhle, A.; Hübner, R.; Kawamoto, A.; et al (December 2021, npj Quantum Materials)

   null (Ed.)

   Abstract Coulomb repulsion among conduction electrons in solids hinders their motion and leads to a rise in resistivity. A regime of electronic phase separation is expected at the first-order phase transition between a correlated metal and a paramagnetic Mott insulator, but remains unexplored experimentally as well as theoretically nearby T  = 0. We approach this issue by assessing the complex permittivity via dielectric spectroscopy, which provides vivid mapping of the Mott transition and deep insight into its microscopic nature. Our experiments utilizing both physical pressure and chemical substitution consistently reveal a strong enhancement of the quasi-static dielectric constant ε 1 when correlations are tuned through the critical value. All experimental trends are captured by dynamical mean-field theory of the single-band Hubbard model supplemented by percolation theory. Our findings suggest a similar ’dielectric catastrophe’ in many other correlated materials and explain previous observations that were assigned to multiferroicity or ferroelectricity. 

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4. Optical generation of high carrier densities in 2D semiconductor heterobilayers

   https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aax0145  

   Wang, Jue; Ardelean, Jenny; Bai, Yusong; Steinhoff, Alexander; Florian, Matthias; Jahnke, Frank; Xu, Xiaodong; Kira, Mackillo; Hone, James; Zhu, X.-Y. (September 2019, Science Advances)

   Controlling charge density in two-dimensional (2D) materials is a powerful approach for engineering new electronic phases and properties. This control is traditionally realized by electrostatic gating. Here, we report an optical approach for generation of high carrier densities using transition metal dichalcogenide heterobilayers, WSe 2 /MoSe 2 , with type II band alignment. By tuning the optical excitation density above the Mott threshold, we realize the phase transition from interlayer excitons to charge-separated electron/hole plasmas, where photoexcited electrons and holes are localized to individual layers. High carrier densities up to 4 × 10 14 cm −2 can be sustained under both pulsed and continuous wave excitation conditions. These findings open the door to optical control of electronic phases in 2D heterobilayers. 

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5. Elevated temperature spectroscopic ellipsometry analysis of the dielectric function, exciton, band-to-band transition, and high-frequency dielectric constant properties for single-crystal ZnGa ₂ O ₄

   https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0087623  

   Hilfiker, Matthew; Williams, Emma; Kilic, Ufuk; Traouli, Yousra; Koeppe, Nate; Rivera, Jose; Abakar, Assya; Stokey, Megan; Korlacki, Rafał; Galazka, Zbigniew; et al (March 2022, Applied Physics Letters)

   We report the elevated temperature (22 °C [Formula: see text]  T [Formula: see text] 600 °C) dielectric function properties of melt grown single crystal ZnGa 2 O 4 using a spectroscopic ellipsometry approach. A temperature dependent Cauchy dispersion analysis was applied across the transparent spectrum to determine the high-frequency index of refraction yielding a temperature dependent slope of 3.885(2) × 10 −5  K −1 . A model dielectric function critical point analysis was applied to examine the dielectric function and critical point transitions for each temperature. The lowest energy M 0 -type critical point associated with the direct bandgap transition in ZnGa 2 O 4 is shown to red-shift linearly as the temperature is increased with a subsequent slope of −0.72(4) meV K −1 . Furthermore, increasing the temperature results in a reduction of the excitonic amplitude and increase in the exciton broadening akin to exciton evaporation and lifetime shortening. This matches current theoretical understanding of excitonic behavior and critically provides justification for an anharmonic broadened Lorentz oscillator to be applied for model analysis of excitonic contributions. 

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