Tony Heinz

About

Tony Heinz is a Professor of Applied Physics and of Photon Science at Stanford University. His research focuses on nanoscience and quantum engineering, specifically investigating the electronic and optical properties of nanoscale systems such as quantum dots, carbon nanotubes, and two-dimensional materials including graphene and transition metal dichalcogenides like MoS2. His work aims to understand the effects of quantum confinement, strong environmental interactions, and many-body phenomena in these reduced-dimensionality materials, which differ significantly from bulk materials. Heinz employs optical spectroscopy techniques spanning from THz to UV, often probing individual nanostructures and ultrafast dynamics through femtosecond laser spectroscopy, to elucidate the properties and potential applications of these materials in photonics and electronic devices. Additionally, his research encompasses condensed matter physics, exploring electronic states and phonons in nanoscale structures, and developing advanced spectroscopic capabilities such as terahertz time-domain spectroscopy and coherent x-ray radiation to study ultrafast surface and nanoscale dynamics.

Research topics

• Physics
• Optics
• Materials science
• Quantum mechanics
• Condensed matter physics
• Optoelectronics
• Chemistry
• Atomic physics
• Chemical physics
• Nanotechnology

Selected publications

• Revealing multiple classes of stable quantum emitters in hexagonal boron nitride with correlated optical and electron microscopy

  Nature Materials · 2020 · 218 citations

  DOI

• Signatures of moiré trions in WSe2/MoSe2 heterobilayers

  Nature · 2021 · 154 citations

  DOI

• Probing topological phase transitions using high-harmonic generation

  Nature Photonics · 2022 · 118 citations

  DOI

• Directly visualizing the momentum-forbidden dark excitons and their dynamics in atomically thin semiconductors

  Science · 2020 · 92 citations

  Resolving momentum degrees of freedom of excitons, which are electron-hole pairs bound by the Coulomb attraction in a photoexcited semiconductor, has remained an elusive goal for decades. In atomically thin semiconductors, such a capability could probe the momentum-forbidden dark excitons, which critically affect proposed opto-electronic technologies but are not directly accessible using optical techniques. Here, we probed the momentum state of excitons in a tungsten diselenide monolayer by phot…

  DOI

• Roadmap for Photonics with 2D Materials

  ACS Photonics · 2025-07-24 · 47 citations

  reviewOpen access

  Triggered by advances in atomic-layer exfoliation and growth techniques, along with the identification of a wide range of extraordinary physical properties in self-standing films consisting of one or a few atomic layers, two-dimensional (2D) materials such as graphene, transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs), and other van der Waals (vdW) crystals now constitute a broad research field expanding in multiple directions through the combination of layer stacking and twisting, nanofabrication, surfac…

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• Collaborative Research: GOALI: Graphene THz/IR Optics: Fundamentals and Emerging Photonics Applications

  NSF · $293k · 2014–2018

• GOALI: Tailoring the Electronic Structure of Few-Layer Graphene for Electronic and Optoelectronic Applications

  NSF · $570k · 2011–2015

• NIRT/SNB: Combined Optical, Electrical, Mechanical, and Thermal Characterization of Individual Nanotubes

  NSF · $1.3M · 2005–2010

Frequent coauthors

• James Hone

  Columbia University

  154 shared

• Alexey Chernikov

  124 shared

• Louis E. Brus

  Columbia University

  93 shared

• Heather M. Hill

  73 shared

• Albert F. Rigosi

  72 shared

• Jie Shan

  Cornell University

  71 shared

• Archana Raja

  University of California, Berkeley

  58 shared

• Aaron M. Lindenberg

  SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory

  58 shared

Labs

• Heinz Research GroupPI

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Education

• Ph.D., Applied Physics

  Stanford University

  1980

• M.S., Physics

  Stanford University

  1976

• B.S., Physics

  University of California, Berkeley

  1974

Similar researchers at Stanford University

• Shanhui Fanh-156
• Robert L. Byerh-106
• Mark Brongersmah-101