Black phosphorus-based van der Waals heterostructures for mid-infrared light-emission applications.

Mid-infrared (MIR) light-emitting devices play a key role in optical communications, thermal imaging, and material analysis applications. Two-dimensional (2D) materials offer a promising direction for next-generation MIR devices owing to their exotic optical properties, as well as the ultimate thickness limit. More importantly, van der Waals heterostructures—combining the best of various 2D materials at an artificial atomic level—provide many new possibilities for constructing MIR light-emitting devices of large tuneability and high integration. Here, we introduce a simple but novel van der Waals heterostructure for MIR light-emission applications built from thin-film BP and transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs), in which BP acts as an MIR light-emission layer. For BP–WSe2 heterostructures, an enhancement of ~200% in the photoluminescence intensities in the MIR region is observed, demonstrating highly efficient energy transfer in this heterostructure with type-I band alignment. For BP–MoS2 heterostructures, a room temperature MIR light-emitting diode (LED) is enabled through the formation of a vertical PN heterojunction at the interface. Our work reveals that the BP–TMDC heterostructure with efficient light emission in the MIR range, either optically or electrically activated, provides a promising platform for infrared light property studies and applications. Layering thin films of semiconducting transition metal dichalcogenides with thin-film black phosphorus enhances its ability to emit mid-infrared (MIR) light, which could facilitate MIR light emission investigations and applications. Xiaolong Chen of China’s Southern University of Science and Technology and colleagues layered thin flakes of black phosphorus (BP) with one or the other of a monolayer of tungsten diselenide (WSe2) or a thin film of molybdenum disulfide (MoS2). Thin-film BP is considered a promising MIR material, with potential applications in MIR photodetection and optical modulation. WSe2 efficiently transferred light energy to the BP, enhancing its MIR photoluminescence by up to 192%. On the other hand, the interface created by layering BP with MoS2 enabled the formation of a MIR light-emitting diode at room temperature.