Slow and highly confined plasmons observed in atomically thin TaS₂

Extreme light confinement down to the atomic scale has been theoretically predicted for ultrathin, Ta-based transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs). In this work, we report the observation of highly confined plasmons in 2H-TaS₂ monolayers and bilayers via momentum-resolved electron energy loss spectroscopy (q-EELS), with a resolution of 0.0056 Å^-1. Momentum-dispersed two-dimensional (2D) plasmon resonances were found to exhibit a lateral confinement ratio up to 300 at large wave vectors of q = 0.15 Å^-1 and slow light behaviour with a group velocity ~10^-4c. Moreover, we observed a transition from 2D to 3D Coulomb interaction in the high-momentum regime, equivalent to light confinement volumes of 1-2 nm³. Remarkably, the resonant modes do not enter the electron-hole continuum, potentially enabling even further enhanced optical field confinements for this material at cryogenic temperatures.