Phys.org  March 22, 2024 Nanomaterials exhibit excitonic quantum processes occurring at room temperature. However, low dimensionality imposes strict requirements for conventional optical excitation. Researchers in Japan found that exciton transfer in carbon-nanotube/tungsten-diselenide heterostructures occur when alignment could be systematically varied. The mixed-dimensional heterostructures displayed a pronounced exciton reservoir effect where the longer-lifetime excitons within the two-dimensional semiconductor were funneled into carbon nanotubes through diffusion. The new excitation pathway presented several advantages, including larger absorption areas, broadband spectral response, and polarization-independent efficiency. When band alignment was resonant, they observed substantially more efficient excitation via tungsten diselenide compared to direct excitation of […]