Microscopic modelling of exciton-polariton diffusion coefficients in atomically thin semiconductors

Abstract: In the strong light-matter coupling regime realized e.g. by integrating semiconductors into optical microcavities, polaritons as new hybrid light-matter quasi-particles are formed. The corresponding change in the dispersion relation has a large impact on optics, dynamics and transport behaviour of semiconductors. In this work, we investigate the strong-coupling regime in hBN-encapsulated MoSe$_2$ monolayers focusing on exciton-polariton diffusion. Applying a microscopic approach based on the exciton density matrix formalism combined with the Hopfield approach, we predict a drastic increase of the diffusion coefficients by two to three orders of magnitude in the strong coupling regime. We explain this behaviour by the much larger polariton group velocity and suppressed polariton-phonon scattering channels with respect to the case of bare excitons. Our study contributes to a better microscopic understanding of polariton diffusion in atomically thin semiconductors.