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O: Fachverband Oberflächenphysik

O 5: Scanning Probe Microscopy: Light-Matter Interactions at the Atomic Scale I

O 5.8: Vortrag

Montag, 17. März 2025, 12:15–12:30, H6

THz Pulse induced Luminescence in a Scanning Tunneling Microscope — •Kurt Lichtenberg, Johannes Schust, Felix Huber, Ines Hartkopf, Susanne Baumann, and Sebastian Loth — University of Stuttgart, Institute for Functional Matter and Quantum Technologies, Stuttgart, Germany

Light-matter interaction at the atomic scale lies at the heart of many processes in nature and technology, ranging from light harvesting to quantum communication applications. But experimental tools to access the respective dynamics at this scale with sufficient time resolution are rare.

Here we show a proof-of-concept combination of the ultrafast time resolution of THz scanning tunneling microscopy (THz STM) with tunneling-induced light emission at the atomic scale (Scanning Tunneling Luminescence).

We use intense sub-cycle THz pulses to excite plasmons in the tunnel junction consisting of a gold tip and a bare silver sample. We find that THz-induced voltage transients ignite luminescence in ultrashort time intervals within a fraction of a single period of the THz pulse that was used for the excitation. These ultrafast luminescence bursts can be used to sample the waveform of a second THz pulse with femtosecond time resolution.

This work contributes to a new line of methodology, that can probe the rich dynamics of light emission from single atoms and molecules.

Keywords: STM; THz; Luminescence; Ultrafast; STL