Stoichiometric modulation on optical nonlinearity of 2D MoSxSe2−x alloys for photonic applications

The composition-engineered band structures of two-dimensional (2D) ternary transition-metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs) semiconductor alloys directly dominate their electronic and optical properties. Herein, in this paper, a detailed theoretical and experimental study on the composition-dependent nonlinear optical properties of 2D MoSxSe2−x alloys was carried out. The first-principles calculations were performed to investigate the compositionally modulated properties of monolayer 2D MoSxSe2−x (x = 0.25, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, and 1.75) in terms of the carrier effective mass, carrier density and mobility, as well as band-gaps. Furthermore, high-quality few-layered MoSxSe2−x (x = 0.2, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, and 1.8) nanosheets were fabricated by using liquid phase exfoliation method. The third-order nonlinear optical response was investigated by open-aperture Z-scan technique, revealing composition-dependent saturable absorption, and light modulation properties, which were correlated to the theoretical calculations and further confirmed by using MoSxSe2−x nanosheets as saturable absorbers (SAs) for all-solid-state pulsed lasers. In particular, a mode-locked solid-state laser with pulse width of 227 fs was realized with MoS0.2Se1.8 as SA, for the first time to our best knowledge. Our work not only provides a comprehensive understanding of the compositionally and defectively modulated nonlinear optical responses of ternary TMDCs alloys, but also paves a way for the development of 2D materials-based novel optoelectronic devices.