We develop a theory of nonlinear response to an electric field of two-dimensional (2D) fermions with topologically non-trivial wave functions characterized by the Berry phase $Φ_n = n π, n = 1,2,...$. In particular, we find that owing to suppression of backscattering at odd $n$, Hall field-induced resistance oscillations, which stem from elastic electron transitions between Hall field-tilted Landau levels, are qualitatively distinct from those at even $n$: their amplitude decays with the electric field and their extrema are phase-shifted by a quarter cycle. The theory unifies the cases of graphene ($n = 1$) and graphite bilayer ($n = 2$) with the case of conventional 2D electron gas ($n = 0$) and suggests a new method to probe backscattering in topological 2D systems.
We propose an experiment to test the uniform-Berry-curvature picture of composite fermions. We show that the asymmetry of geometrical resonances observed in a periodically modulated composite fermion system can be explained with the uniform-Berry-curvature picture. Moreover, we show that an alternative way of modulating the system, i.e., modulating the external magnetic field, will induce an asymmetry opposite to that of the usual periodic grating modulation which effectively modulates the Chern-Simons field. The experiment can serve as a critical test of the uniform-Berry-curvature picture, a…
The fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE) in two-dimensional electron system (2DES) is an exotic, superfluid-like matter with an emergent topological order. From the consideration of Aharonov-Bohm interaction of electrons and magnetic field, the ground state of a half-filled lowest Landau level is mathematically transformed to a Fermi sea of composite objects of electrons bound to two flux quanta, termed composite fermions (CFs). A strong support for the CF theories comes from experimental confirmation of the predicted Fermi surface at $ν$ = 1/2 (where $ν$ is the Landau level filling factor) f…
We propose a general framework of nonlinear optics induced by non-Abelian Berry curvature in time-reversal-invariant (TRI) insulators. We find that the third-order response of a TRI insulator under optical and terahertz light fields is directly related to the integration of the non-Abelian Berry curvature over the Brillouin zone. We apply the result to insulators with rotational symmetry near the band edge. Under resonant excitations, the optical susceptibility is proportional to the flux of the Berry curvature through the iso-energy surface, which is equal to the Chern number of the surface t…
The quantum Hall superfluid is presently the only viable candidate for a realization of quasiparticles with fractional Berry phase statistics. For a simple vortex excitation, relevant for a subset of fractional Hall states considered by Laughlin, non-trivial Berry phase statistics were demonstrated many years ago by Arovas, Schrieffer, and Wilczek. The quasiparticles are in general more complicated, described accurately in terms of excited composite fermions. We use the method developed by Kjonsberg, Myrheim and Leinaas to compute the Berry phase for a single composite-fermion quasiparticle, a…
Transport due to spin-helical massless Dirac fermion surface state is of paramount importance to realize various new physical phenomena in topological insulators, ranging from quantum anomalous Hall effect to Majorana fermions. However, one of the most important hallmarks of topological surface states, the Dirac linear band dispersion, has been difficult to reveal directly in transport measurements. Here we report experiments on Bi2Te3 nanoribbon ambipolar field effect devices on high-k SrTiO3 substrates, where we achieve a gate-tuned bulk metal-insulator transition and the topological transpo…
Berry phase plays an important role in many non-trivial phenomena over a broad range of many-body systems. In this thesis we focus on the Berry phase due to the change of the particles' momenta, and study its effects in free and interacting fermionic systems. We start with reviewing the semi-classical kinetic theory with Berry phase for a non-interacting ensemble of fermions -- a Berry Fermi gas -- which might be far-from-equilibrium. We particularly review the famous Berry phase contribution to the anomalous Hall current. We then provide a concrete and general path integral derivation for the…
Triple-component fermions are pseudospin-1 quasiparticles hosted by certain three-band semimetals in the vicinity of their band-touching nodes [Phys. Rev. B {\bf 100}, 235201 (2019)]. The excitations comprise of a flat band and two dispersive bands. The energies of the dispersive bands are $E_{\pm}=\pm\sqrt{α^2_n k^{2n}_\perp+v^2_z k^2_z}$ with $k_\perp=\sqrt{k^2_x+k^2_y}$ and $n=1,2,3$. In this work, we obtain the exact expression of Berry curvature, approximate form of density of states and Fermi energy as a function of carrier density for any value of $n$. In particular, we study the Berry …
The zero gap surface states of a 3D-topological insulator host Dirac fermions with spin locked to the momentum. The gap-less Dirac fermions exhibit electronic behaviour different from those predicted in conventional materials. While calculations based on a simple linear dispersion can account for observed experimental patterns, a more accurate match is obtained by including higher order $ \overrightarrow{k}$ terms in the Hamiltonian. In this work, in presence of a time reversal symmetry breaking external magnetic field and higher order warping term, alteration to the topologically ordained Ber…
A valley-contrasting Berry curvature in bilayer transition metal dichalcogenides with spin-orbit coupling can generate valley magnetization when the inversion symmetry is broken, for example, by an electric field, regardless of time-reversal symmetry. A nontrivial Berry curvature can also lead to anomalous transport responses, such as the anomalous Hall effect and the anomalous Nernst effect. Applied to a bilayer WSe$_2$, an electric field can tune the Berry curvature and orbital magnetic moment, which has important consequences for the orbital magnetization and the anomalous Nernst responses.…
We construct explicit lowest-Landau-level wave functions for the composite-fermion Fermi sea and its low energy excitations following a recently developed approach [Pu, Wu and Jain, Phys. Rev. B 96, 195302 (2018)] and demonstrate them to be very accurate representations of the Coulomb eigenstates. We further ask how the Berry phase associated with a closed loop around the Fermi circle, predicted to be $π$ in a Dirac composite fermion theory satisfying particle-hole symmetry [D. T. Son, Phys. Rev. X 5, 031027 (2015)], is affected by Landau level mixing. For this purpose, we consider a simple mo…
There are known two distinct types of the integer quantum Hall effect. One is the conventional quantum Hall effect, characteristic of two-dimensional semiconductor systems, and the other is its relativistic counterpart recently observed in graphene, where charge carriers mimic Dirac fermions characterized by Berry's phase pi, which results in a shifted positions of Hall plateaus. Here we report a third type of the integer quantum Hall effect. Charge carriers in bilayer graphene have a parabolic energy spectrum but are chiral and exhibit Berry's phase 2pi affecting their quantum dynamics. The L…
Single-layer carbon, or graphene, demonstrates amazing transport properties, such as the minimum conductivity near $\frac{4e^2}{h}$ independent of shapes and mobility of samples. This indicates there exist some unusual effects due to specific Dirac dispersion relation of fermion in two dimensions. By deriving fermion-lattice interaction Hamiltonian we show that Berry phases can be produced in fermion states around two Dirac points by relative rotations of two sublattices. The Berry phases in turn remove the degeneracies of energies for states near the Fermi surface, leading to a dynamical inst…
The half filled Landau level is expected to be approximately particle-hole symmetric, which requires an extension of the Halperin-Lee-Read (HLR) theory of the compressible state observed at this filling. Recent work indicates that, when particle-hole symmetry is preserved, the composite Fermions experience a quantized $π$-Berry phase upon winding around the composite Fermi-surface, analogous to Dirac fermions at the surface of a 3D topological insulator. In contrast, the effective low energy theory of the composite fermion liquid originally proposed by HLR lacks particle-hole symmetry and has …
We study theoretically the electrical transport of two-dimensional (2D) massive Dirac fermions, which are described by the 2 by 2 massive Dirac Hamiltonian, and with a gap at the charge neutrality point. Through analytical diagrammatical calculations of electrical conductivity in the presence of long range Coulomb scattering centers, we show that attendant with the variation of the Berry phase from 0 to π as the Fermi energy moves away from the Dirac point/band boundary, a continuous Anderson-localization (AL) to weak-localization (WL), and further to weak anti-localization (WAL) transition oc…
Symmetry protected quantization of the Berry phase is discussed in relation to edge states. Assuming an existence of some adiabatic process which protects quantization of the Berry phase, non trivial Berry phase $γ=\pm 2πρ$ ($ρ$ is a local filling of particles) for the bulk suggests appearance of edge states with boundaries. We have applied this generic consideration for Bloch states of some two dimensional model with massless Dirac fermions where $γ=\pmπ/2$ implies the edge states. Entanglement entropy is evaluated for the models and its relation to the bulk-edge correspondence of Dirac fermi…
A new nonlinear scheme of high harmonics generation in a wide class of time-reversal invariant materials with broken spatial inversion symmetry (where recently the nonlinear Hall effect has been established) due to the nontrivial topology of bands is proposed. A microscopic quasiclassical theory describing the nonperturbative optical response of pseudo-relativistic electrons with nonzero Berry curvature of bands to a strong laser field is developed. We analyze the harmonic content of the induced current and show that one can decouple induced laser harmonics solely by the Berry curvature of ban…
Second-order dc conductivity in the velocity-gauge Keldysh formalism: gauge-invariant decomposition into nonlinear Drude, Berry-curvature-dipole, and quantum-metric responses
The polarization of a material and its response to applied electric and magnetic fields are key solid-state properties with a long history in insulators, although a satisfactory theory required new concepts such as Berry-phase gauge fields. In metals, quantities such as static polarization and magnetoelectric $θ$-term cease to be well-defined. In polar metals there can be analogous dynamical current responses, which we study in a common theoretical framework. We find that current responses to dynamical strain in polar metals depend on both the first and second Chern forms, related to polarizat…
The stability of three-dimensional relativistic semimetals to disorder has recently attracted great attention, but the effect of disorder remains elusive for multifold fermions, that are not present in the framework of quantum field theory. In this paper, we investigate one type of multifold fermions, so-called triple-point fermions (TPFs), which have pseudospin-1 degrees of freedom and topological charges $\pm2$. Specifically, we consider the effect of disorder on a minimal, three-band tight-binding model, which realizes the minimal number of two TPFs. The numerically-obtained, disorder-avera…
Recently, the topological flat bands and spin Hall effect have been experimentally observed in the AB-stacked MoTe$_2$/WSe$_2$ heterostructures. In this work, we systematically study the Berry curvature effects in moiré transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) heterobilayers. We point out that the moiré potential of the remote conduction bands would induce a sizable periodic pseudo-magnetic field (PMF) on the valence band. This periodic PMF creates net Berry curvature flux in each valley of the moiré Brillouin zone. The combination of the effect of the Berry curvature and the spin-valley locking …
The physical properties of metals are often given by the sum of the contributions from the electrons consisting the Fermi surface (FS), and therefore, fine structures of the electronic bands and Bloch functions are often masked by the integral over FS. As a consequence, usually, the singular structures in the electronic bands are often not reflected to the macroscopic quantities. In this work, we investigate the anomaly-related magnetoresistance in metals with type-II Weyl nodes close to the FS, and find that the anomaly-related current increases divergently, showing a singular structure. Deta…
We provide a unified semiclassical theory for thermoelectric responses of any observable represented by an operator $\hat{\boldsymbolθ}$ that is well-defined in periodic crystals. The Einstein and Mott relations are established generally, in the presence of Berry-phase effects, for various physical realizations of $\hat{\boldsymbolθ}$ in electronic systems, including the familiar case of the electric current as well as the currently controversial cases of the spin polarization and spin current. The magnetization current, which has been proven indispensable in the thermoelectric response of ele…
HgCdTe at a critical cadmium doping has a bulk dispersion which includes two linear cones meeting at a single point at zero energy, intersecting a nearly flat band, similar to the pseudospin-1 Dirac-Weyl system. In the presence of a finite magnetic field, these bands condense into highly degenerate Landau levels. We have numerically calculated the frequency-dependent magneto-optical and zero-field conductivity of this material using the Kane model. The calculations show good agreement with recent experimental measurements. We discuss the signature of the flat band and the split peaks of the ma…
We study theoretically the optical response of the surface states of a topological insulator, especially the generation of helicity-dependent direct current by circularly polarized light. Interestingly, the dominant current, due to an interband transition, is controlled by the Berry curvature of the surface bands. This extends the connection between photocurrents and Berry curvature beyond the quasiclassical approximation where it has been shown to hold. Explicit expressions are derived for the (111) surface of the topological insulator Bi_{2}Se_{3} where we find significant helicity dependent…
Various nonlinear characteristics of solid states, such as the circular photogalvanic effect of time-reversal symmetric insulators, the quantized photogalvanic effect of Weyl semimetals, and the nonlinear Hall effect of time-reversal symmetric metals, have been associated with the Berry curvature dipole (BCD). Here, we explore the question of whether the Berry curvature dipole and multipoles of time-reversal symmetric insulators can be traced in the nonlinear optical responses. We performed real-time time-dependent density functional theory calculations and examined the second harmonic generat…
Light-tunable quantum metric non-linear Hall response in Berry dipole semimetals
Centre for Nanotechnology, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee（印度理工学院鲁尔基分校纳米技术中心）；Solid State and Structural Chemistry Unit, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore（印度科学学院固态与结构化学单元）
Here we report the evidence of the type II Dirac Fermion in the layered crystal PdTe2. The de Haas-van Alphen oscillations find a small Fermi pocket with a cross section of 0.077nm-2 with a nontrivial Berry phase. First-principal calculations reveal that it is originated from the hole pocket of a tilted Dirac cone. Angle Resolved Photoemission Spectroscopy demonstrates a type II Dirac cone featured dispersion. We also suggest PdTe2 is an improved platform to host the topological superconductors.
Bi$_{2}$Se$_{3}$ is a well known 3D-topological insulators(TI) with a non-trivial Berry phase of $ \left(2n+1\right)π$ attributed to the topology of the band structure. The Berry phase shows non-topological deviations from $ \left(2n+1\right)π$ in presence of a perturbation that destroys time reversal symmetry and gives rise to a quantum system with massive Dirac fermions and finite band gap. Such a band gap opening is achieved on account of the exchange field of a ferromagnet or the intrinsic energy gap of a superconductor that influences the topological insulator surface states by virtue of …
We theoretically study the role of the Berry curvature on neutral and charged excitons in two-dimensional transition-metal dichalcogenides. The Berry curvature arises due to a strong coupling between the conduction and valence bands in these materials that can to great extent be described within the model of massive Dirac fermions. The Berry curvature lifts the degeneracy of exciton states with opposite angular momentum. Using an electronic interaction that accounts for non-local screening effects, we find a Berry-curvature induced splitting of $\sim 17$ meV between the 2$p_{-}$ and 2$p_{+}$ e…
We show that the strongly spin-orbit coupled materials Bi2Te3 and Sb2Te3 (first non-Bi topological insulator) and their derivatives belong to the Z2 (Time-Reversal-Protected, elastic backscattering suppressed) topological-insulator class. Using a combination of first-principles theoretical calculations and photoemission spectroscopy, we directly show that Bi2Te3 is a large spin-orbit-induced indirect bulk band gap (about 150 meV) semiconductor whose surface is characterized by a single topological spin-Dirac cone. The electronic structure of self-doped Sb2Te3 exhibits similar Z2 topological pr…
Spectral analysis of Shubnikov de Haas (SdH) oscillations of magnetoresistance and of Quantum Hall Effect (QHE) measured in quasi-2D highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) [Phys. Rev. Lett. 90, 156402 (2003)] reveals two types of carriers: normal (massive) electrons with Berry phase 0 and Dirac-like (massless) holes with Berry phase pi. We demonstrate that recently reported integer- and semi-integer QHE for bi-layer and single-layer graphenes take place simultaneously in HOPG samples.
We study the weak antilocalization (WAL) effect in the magnetoresistance of narrow HgTe wires fabricated in quantum wells (QWs) with normal and inverted band ordering. Measurements at different gate voltages indicate that the WAL is only weakly affected by Rashba spin-orbit splitting and persists when the Rashba splitting is about zero. The WAL signal in wires with normal band ordering is an order of magnitude smaller than for inverted ones. These observations are attributed to a Dirac-like topology of the energy bands in HgTe QWs. From the magnetic-field and temperature dependencies we extrac…
Nonlinear optical response is well studied in the context of semiconductors and has gained a renaissance in studies of topological materials in the recent decade. So far it mainly deals with non-magnetic materials and it is believed to root in the Berry curvature of the material band structure. In this work, we revisit the general formalism for the second-order optical response and focus on the consequences of the time-reversal-symmetry ($\mathcal{T}$) breaking, by a diagrammatic approach. We have identified three physical mechanisms to generate a dc photocurrent, i.e. the Berry curvature, the…
We report two-dimensional quantum transport and Dirac fermions in YbMnBi2 single crystals. YbMnBi2 is a layered material with anisotropic conductivity and magnetic order below 290 K. Magnetotransport properties, nonzero Berry phase and small cyclotron mass indicate the presence of quasi two dimensional Dirac fermions. Quantum oscillations in Hall resistivity suggest the presence of both electron and hole parts of the Fermi surface whereas the Berry phase suggests spin-orbit coupling.
Recently, charge or spin nonlinear transport with nontrivial topological properties in crystal materials has attracted much attention. In this paper, we perform a comprehensive symmetry analysis for all 122 magnetic point groups (MPGs) and provide a useful dictionary for charge and spin nonlinear transport from Berry curvature dipole, Berry connection polarization and Drude term with nontrivial topological nature. The results are obtained by making a full symmetry investigation on matrix representations of six nonlinear response tensors. We further identify every MPG that can accommodate two o…
We show that the non-Abelian Berry phase emerges naturally in the s-wave and spin quintet pairing channel of spin-3/2 fermions. The topological structure of this pairing condensate is characterized by the second Chern number. This topological structure can be realized in ultra-cold atomic systems and in solid state systems with at least two Kramers doublets.
We theoretically study the effect of the Berry curvature on the transport properties of Weyl semimetals in the nonadiabatic process, which results in nonlinear optical responses. In the adiabatic process, the Berry curvature, which involves the time derivative of the Bloch states, contributes to the transport properties such as the adiabatic Thouless pump. Although this effect is very weak in usual solids, it is enhanced in Weyl semimetals, where the Berry curvature contributes to observable nonlinear optical responses due to its nodal structure. In this paper, using semiclassical Boltzmann th…
Real magnetic and lattice deformation gauge fields have been investigated in honeycomb lattice of graphene. The coexistence of these two gauges will induce a gap difference between two valley points ($K$ and $K'$) of system. This gap difference allows us to study the possible topological valley Hall current and valley polarization in the graphene sheet. In the absence of magnetic field, the strain alone could not generate a valley polarization when the Fermi energy coincides exactly with the Dirac points. Since in this case there is not any imbalance between the population of the valley points…
Quantum oscillations can be used to determine properties of the Fermi surface of metals by varying the magnitude and orientation of an external magnetic field. Topological insulator surface states are an unusual mix of normal and Dirac fermions. Unlike in graphene and simple metals, Berry's geometric phase in topological insulator surface states is not necessarily quantised. We show that reliably extracting this geometric phase from the phase offset associated with the quantum oscillations is subtle. This is especially so in the presence of a Dirac gap such as that associated with the Zeeman s…
This is a short review of two-dimensional Dirac fermions in graphene and similar systems such as boron nitride, quasi-2D organic salts $α$-(BEDT-TTF)$_2$I$_3$, artificial graphene with cold atoms in optical lattices, etc. The emphasis is on magnetic field properties (semi-classical quantization of cyclotron orbits, Landau levels, quantum Hall effect, magneto-plasmons, magneto-phonon resonance, magneto-transport, etc.) and on topological properties (Berry phase, winding number, inter-band effects, merging transition of Dirac points, etc.).
Phonon mode splitting and phonon anomaly in multiband electron systems
Institut für Physik, Universität Augsburg（奥格斯堡大学物理研究所）；Physics Department, New York City College of Technology, The City University of New York（纽约市立大学纽约城市技术学院物理系）
We derive the definition of the Berry phase for the adiabatic transport of a composite fermion (CF) in a half-filled composite Fermi-liquid (CFL). It is found to be different from that adopted in previous investigations by Geraedts et al. For the standard CFL wave function, we analytically show that the Berry curvature is uniformly distributed in the momentum space. For the Jain-Kamilla wave function, we numerically show that its Berry curvature has a continuous distribution inside the Fermi sea and vanishes outside. We conclude that the CF with respect to both the microscopic wave-functions i…
Noncentrosymmetric metals are anticipated to exhibit a $dc$ photocurrent in the nonlinear optical response caused by the Berry curvature dipole in momentum space. Weyl semimetals (WSMs) are expected to be excellent candidates for observing these nonlinear effects because they carry a large Berry curvature concentrated in small regions, i.e., near the Weyl points. We have implemented the semiclassical Berry curvature dipole formalism into an $ab~initio$ scheme and investigated the second-order nonlinear response for two representative groups of materials: the TaAs-family type-I WSMs and MoTe$_2…
We study the ac Hall response induced by passage of dc transport current in two- and three-dimensional metals with gyrotropic point groups -- the gyrotropic Hall effect -- and consider the phenomenon of current-induced optical activity in noncentrosymmetric metals as a physical application of our theory. While the effect is expected to be present in single crystals of any noncentrosymmetric metal, we expect it to be strongest in enantiomorphic Weyl semimetals. Using the semiclassical kinetic equation approach we present several mechanisms underlying the gyrotropic Hall effect. Amongst them, th…
