Excitonic Beam Steering in an Active van der Waals Metasurface

Two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides (2D TMDCs) are promising candidates for ultrathin active nanophotonic elements due to the strong tunable excitonic resonances that dominate their optical response. Here, we demonstrate dynamic beam steering by an active van der Waals metasurface that leverages large complex refractive index tunability near excitonic resonances in monolayer molybdenum diselenide (MoSe₂). Through varying the radiative and nonradiative rates of the excitons, we can dynamically control both the reflection amplitude and phase profiles, resulting in an excitonic phased array metasurface. Our experiments show reflected light steering to angles between -30° and 30° at different resonant wavelengths corresponding to the A exciton and B exciton. This active van der Waals metasurface relies solely on the excitonic resonances of the monolayer MoSe₂ material rather than geometric resonances of patterned nanostructures, suggesting the potential to harness the tunability of excitonic resonances for wavefront shaping in emerging photonic applications.