When excitons lose their mass

Subjects Electronic properties and materialsTwo-dimensional materials Excitons are commonly regarded as massive composite quasiparticles. Now, experiments show that, in two-dimensional materials, light–matter interactions can turn excitons into massless collective modes with linear, photon-like dispersions. Access through your institution Buy or subscribe This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution Access options Access through your institution Access Nature and 54 other Nature Portfolio journals Get Nature+, our best-value online-access subscription $32.99 / 30 days cancel any time Learn more Subscribe to this journal Receive 12 print issues and online access $259.00 per year only $21.58 per issue Learn more Rent or buy this article Prices vary by article type from$1.95 to$39.95 Learn more Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout Fig. 1: Momentum-resolved electron energy-loss spectroscopic study and the dispersion of the lowest-energy bright exciton in two-dimensional materials. ReferencesLiu, L. Y. et al. Nat. Phys. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-026-03193-8 (2026).Article Google Scholar Qiu, D. Y., Cao, T. & Louie, S. G. Phys. Rev. Lett. 115, 176801 (2015).Article ADS Google Scholar Hong, J., Senga, R., Pichler, T. & Suenaga, K. Phys. Rev. Lett. 124, 087401 (2020).Article ADS Google Scholar Hong, J. et al. ACS Nano 15, 7783–7789 (2021).Article Google Scholar Download referencesAcknowledgementsJ.Z. thanks X. Jiang and Q. Zheng for helping with the proofreading and figure.Author informationAuthors and AffiliationsDepartment of Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui, ChinaJin ZhaoICQD/Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui, ChinaJin ZhaoAuthorsJin ZhaoView author publicationsSearch author on:PubMed Google ScholarCorresponding authorCorrespondence to Jin Zhao.Ethics declarations Competing interests The author declares no competing interests. Rights and permissionsReprints and permissionsAbout this articleCite this articleZhao, J. When excitons lose their mass. Nat. Phys. (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-026-03214-6Download citationPublished: 16 March 2026Version of record: 16 March 2026DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-026-03214-6Share this articleAnyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:Get shareable linkSorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.Copy shareable link to clipboard Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative