<This video is meant for academic purpose only.>

►【International Young Scholar Forum】

Title：Controlling light-matter interactions using two-dimensional materials and heterostructures

Time: 10:00am, 21st July, 2020

Speaker: Dr. You Zhou, Harvard University

Abstract: 

The study of interactions between light and matter has played a central role in the development of quantum physics and underlies a range of technological applications. Recent efforts to control light-matter interactions promise to bolster new applications, such as quantum information processing, but remain challenging due to our limited ability to tailor the properties of optical materials.

In this talk, I will describe how the study and manipulation of excitons in two-dimensional semiconductors open up exciting new avenues for controlling light-matter interactions. I will discuss our efforts to improve the quality of atomically thin semiconductors and to understand their fundamental excitonic properties. I will then show how this fundamental understanding, along with careful engineering of their photonic environment, enables us to dramatically modulate the photoluminescence lifetime of excitons in these 2D semiconductors. Finally, I will demonstrate how controlling new degrees of freedom in creating 2D heterostructures, such as the twist angle between different layers, leads to new ways to engineer light-matter interactions at the nanoscale.

Brief CV of Dr. You Zhou :

Dr. You Zhou is a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University and will join the University of Maryland, College Park as an assistant professor in 2021. He earned his Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Harvard in 2015, after receiving his bachelor’s degree in Physics from Peking University in 2010. His research focuses on understanding the behaviors of electrons, excitons, and ions in quantum materials, such as strongly correlated oxides and 2D materials.