Magnetic-Field-Induced Wigner Crystallization of Charged Interlayer Excitons in van der Waals Heterostructures

TL;DR

This paper develops a theoretical framework for magnetic-field-induced Wigner crystallization of charged interlayer excitons in TMD heterobilayers, predicting observable phase transitions in magneto-photoluminescence experiments.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive theory for Wigner crystallization of CIEs under magnetic fields, including energy ratio analysis and generalized g-factor concepts.

Findings

Derived the potential-to-kinetic energy ratio for CIEs in magnetic fields.

Analyzed weak and strong magnetic field regimes for crystallization.

Predicted observable crystallization and melting transitions in experiments.

Abstract

We develop the theory of the magnetic-field-induced Wigner crystallization effect for charged interlayer excitons (CIE) discovered recently in transition-metal-dichalcogenide (TMD) heterobilayers. We derive the ratio of the average potential interaction energy to the average kinetic energy for the many-particle CIE system subjected to the perpendicular magnetic field of an arbitrary strength, analyze the weak and strong field regimes, and discuss the 'cold' crystallization phase transition for the CIE system in the strong field regime. We also generalize the effective g-factor concept previously formulated for interlayer excitons, to include the formation of CIEs in electrostatically doped TMD heterobilayers. We show that magnetic-field-induced Wigner crystallization and melting of CIEs can be observed in strong-field magneto-photoluminescence experiments with TMD heterobilayes of systematically varied electron-hole doping concentrations. Our results advance the capabilities of this new family of transdimensional quantum materials.