Topology-optimized dielectric cavities for enhanced excitonic light emission from WSe2

Photonic inverse design and, especially, topology optimization, enable dielectric cavities with deeply sub-diffraction mode volumes and high quality factors, thus offering a powerful platform for enhanced light-matter coupling. Here, we design and fabricate arrays of CMOS-compatible silicon cavities on sapphire with extreme subwavelength transverse mode sizes of only 30–40 nm ( $${{\bf{V}}}{{\boldsymbol{\sim }}}{{{\boldsymbol{\lambda }}}}^{{{\boldsymbol{3}}}}/{{\boldsymbol{2500}}}$$ V ~ λ 3 / 2500 ). These cavities are engineered for deterministic coupling to a monolayer (or few-layer) excitonic material, producing strong near-field localization directly beneath the 2D material. Photoluminescence (PL) measurements show reproducible tenfold raw enhancement relative to bare silicon, which corresponds to a “per-area” normalized enhancement on the order of 10 ³ , accounting for the small area of the deeply subwavelength mode volume, consistent with numerical simulations that account for material absorption and fabrication tolerances. Furthermore, time-resolved PL measurements reveal pronounced lifetime shortening and non-exponential dynamics, indicating cavity-mediated exciton-exciton interactions. The optimized cavity geometry enhances the far-field collection efficiency and supports scalable integration with van der Waals semiconductors. Our results show that the arrays of topology-optimized dielectric cavities are a versatile, scalable platform for controlling excitonic emission and interactions, which creates new opportunities in nonlinear optics, optoelectronics, and quantum photonics.