Destructive interference of second harmonic generation in AA-stacked MoTe 2 /WSe 2

Abstract

The stacking configuration of two-dimensional materials critically governs their optical and electronic responses. Monolayer transition-metal dichalcogenides (TMDC) lack inversion symmetry and exhibit exciton-enhanced second-harmonic generation (SHG). In TMDC bilayers, 60° (0°) stacking is conventionally expected to suppress (enhance) SHG owing to destructive (constructive) interference of the layer-resolved nonlinear polarizations. Here, we report an unconventional destructive SHG interference in nearly 0°-stacked (AA-stacked) MoTe2/WSe2 heterobilayers using two independent probes: atomic-resolution imaging and stacking-sensitive exciton hybridization measurements. Supported by ab initio GW and Bethe-Salpeter equation calculations, we show that distinct two-photon resonances associated with the WSe2 C exciton and the MoTe2 D exciton generate a nearly $π$ phase difference ($Δϕ$) in their second-order nonlinear susceptibilities $χ^{(2)}$, leading to the anomalous destructive interference. We further demonstrate that in small-angle twisted MoTe2/WSe2, the SHG polarization state is governed by the interplay between twist angle $α$ and phase difference $Δϕ$, and can be mapped onto trajectories on the Poincaré sphere. At excitation energies satisfying $Δϕ$ + 3$α$ = 180°, the SHG output becomes nearly circularly polarized (ellipticity ~ 0.91) and undergoes an abrupt 90° azimuthal rotation, corresponding to a geometric polarization singularity in the parameter space. Our findings open new routes for exciton-resonance engineered nonlinear photonics and stacking-resolved optical functionality in moiré materials.

The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Physical Review X, 2026 · DOI ↗