Multimodal, Element-Selective X-ray Characterization of Two-dimensional Materials using Momentum Microscopy

Abstract: Two-dimensional materials (2D) carry properties that potentially enable more efficient electronic transport. Their exotic characteristics potentially open a new paradigm for electronic devices. Recently, quantum devices made from 2D materials, particularly transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs), demonstrated the potential for enabling high speed electron transport. Comprehensive understanding of the electronic and atomic properties can provide guidance to designing new materials for real world applications, which faces many grand challenges. X-ray imaging, spectroscopy, and scattering can yield unprecedented insights into fundamental properties of matter. Meanwhile, the recent novel technique —time-of-flight momentum microscopy (ToF-MM)— enables direct and simultaneous measurements of the momentum and spatial maps in three-dimensional space that reveal information on the electronic structure and lattice parameters that are conventionally inaccessible. By combining ultrafast laser excitation, x-ray characterization, and ToF-MM we can enable both precise control and characterization of materials and tailor them for applications.

Bio: Quynh is an associate scientist in the Science Research Development Division of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. She completed her B.S. in Chemistry at Temple University as an NIH Undergraduate Research Fellow, and her PhD in Physics at JILA-University of Colorado Boulder & NIST as NSF Graduate Research Fellow. At JILA, Quynh focused on tailoring structured light pulses in the extreme-ultraviolet via high harmonic generation and probing electron-phonon coupling dynamics of high energy density matter. She then became a Q-FARM Bloch Postdoctoral Fellow at the LCLS and Stanford PULSE Institute, where she combined ultrafast lasers, synchrotron, and free-electron laser facilities to investigate electron-phonon coupling dynamics of quantum materials.