Enhanced interactions of interlayer excitons in free-standing heterobilayers

Strong, long-range dipole–dipole interactions between interlayer excitons (IXs) can lead to new multiparticle correlation regimes^1,2, which drive the system into distinct quantum and classical phases^2–5, including dipolar liquids, crystals and superfluids. Both repulsive and attractive dipole–dipole interactions have been theoretically predicted between IXs in a semiconductor bilayer^2,6–8, but only repulsive interactions have been reported experimentally so far^3,9–16. This study investigated free-standing, twisted (51°, 53°, 45°) tungsten diselenide/tungsten disulfide (WSe₂/WS₂) heterobilayers, in which we observed a transition in the nature of dipolar interactions among IXs, from repulsive to attractive. This was caused by quantum-exchange-correlation effects, leading to the appearance of a robust interlayer biexciton phase (formed by two IXs), which has been theoretically predicted^6–8 but never observed before in experiments. The reduced dielectric screening in a free-standing heterobilayer not only resulted in a much higher formation efficiency of IXs, but also led to strongly enhanced dipole–dipole interactions, which enabled us to observe the many-body correlations of pristine IXs at the two-dimensional quantum limit. In addition, we firstly observed several emission peaks from moiré-trapped IXs at room temperature in a well-aligned, free-standing WSe₂/WS₂ heterobilayer. Our findings open avenues for exploring new quantum phases with potential for applications in non-linear optics.