我们提出一项基于第一性原理的理论研究，采用非线性响应理论考察线偏振光在第二类Weyl半金属TaIrTe4中产生的直流光电流。我们报告了若干非线性光学效应的低能谱。在二阶层面，我们考虑了位移电流和注入电流。假设存在内建静电场，在三阶层面我们研究了电流诱导的位移电流和注入电流，以及jerk电流。我们结合最近在该材料中测量到异常大光电导的实验[J. Ma et al., Nat. Mater. 18, 476 (2019)]对结果进行了讨论。根据我们的结果，jerk电流最有可能是该巨大响应的来源。最后，我们提出了在时间分辨实验中辨别所涉及各种机制重要性的方法。
英文摘要：
We present a first principles theoretical study employing nonlinear response theory to investigate the d.c. photocurrent generated by linearly polarized light in the type-II Weyl semimetal TaIrTe4. We report the low energy spectrum of several nonlinear optical effects. At second-order, we consider the shift and injection currents. Assuming the presence of a built-in static electric field, at third-order we study the current-induced shift and injection currents, as well as the jerk current. We discuss our results in the context of a recent experiment measuring an exceptionally large photoconductivity in this material [J. Ma et at., Nat. Mater. 18, 476 (2019)]. According to our results, the jerk current is the most likely origin of the large response. Finally, we propose means to discern the importance of the various mechanisms involved in a time-resolved experiment.
We study the effect of the strain on the energy bands of TaIrTe4 sheet and the photocurrent in the Cu-TaIrTe4-Cu heterojunction by using the quantum transport simulations. It is found that the Weyl points can be completely broken with increasing of the strain along z dirction. One can obtain a large photocurrent in the Cu-TaIrTe4-Cu heterojunction in the absence of the strain. While the photocurrent can be sharply enhanced by the strain and reach a large value. Accordingly, the maximum values of the photocurrent can be explained in terms of the transitions between peaks of density of states an…
The recent explosion of research interest in Weyl semimetals has led to many proposed Weyl semimetal candidates and a few experimental observations of a Weyl semimetal in real materials. Through this experience, we have come to appreciate that typical Weyl semimetals host many Weyl points. For instance, the first Weyl semimetal observed in experiment, TaAs, hosts 24 Weyl points. Similarly, the Mo$_x$W$_{1-x}$Te$_2$ series, recently under study as the first Type II Weyl semimetal, has eight Weyl points. However, it is well-understood that for a Weyl semimetal without inversion symmetry but with…
TaIrTe$_4$ is an example of a candidate Weyl type-II semimetal with a minimal possible number of Weyl nodes. Four nodes are reported to exist a single plane in $k$-space. The existence of a conical dispersion linked to Weyl nodes has yet to be shown experimentally. Here we use optical spectroscopy as a probe of the band structure on a low-energy scale. Studying optical conductivity allows us to probe intraband and interband transitions with zero momentum. In TaIrTe$_4$, we observe a narrow Drude contribution and an interband conductivity that may be consistent with a tilted linear band dispers…
We propose a new type of photoresponse induced in asymmetric Weyl semimetals in an external magnetic field. In usual symmetric Weyl semimetals in a magnetic field, the particles and holes produced by an incident light in different Weyl cones have opposite helicities and hence move in opposite directions, canceling each others's contributions to the photocurrent. However this cancelation does not occur if the Weyl semimetal possesses both a broken particle-hole symmetry and a broken spatial inversion symmetry. We call the resulting generation of photocurrent the helical magnetic effect because …
We present results of a theoretical study of photocurrents in the Weyl semimetals belonging to the gyrotropic symmetry classes. We show that, in weakly gyrotropic symmetry classes C$_{nv}$ ($n = 3,4,6$), the circular photocurrent transverse to the incidence direction appears only with account, in the electron effective Hamiltonian, for both linear and quadratic or cubic in quasi-momentum spin-dependent terms as well as a spin-independent term resulting in the tilt of the cone dispersion. A polarization-independent magneto-induced photocurrent is predicted which is also allowed in gyrotropic sy…
We develop a theory of the direct interband and indirect intraband photogalvanic effects in Weyl semimetals belonging to the gyrotropic classes with improper symmetry operations. At zero magnetic field, an excitation of such a material with circularly polarized light leads to a photocurrent whose direction depends on the light helicity. We show that in the semimetals of the C$_{2v}$ symmetry, an allowance for the tilt term in the effective Hamiltonian is enough to prevent cancellation of the photocurrent contributions from the Weyl cones of opposite chiralities. In the case of the C$_{4v}$ sym…
Recent breakthrough in search for the analogs of fundamental particles in condensed matter systems lead to experimental realizations of 3D Dirac and Weyl semimetals. Weyl state can be hosted either by non-centrosymmetric or magnetic materials and can be of the first or the second type. Several non-centrosymmetric materials have been proposed to be type-II Weyl semimetals, but in all of them the Fermi arcs between projections of multiple Weyl points either have not been observed directly or they were hardly distinguishable from the trivial surface states which significantly hinders the practica…
We investigate polarization-dependent ultrafast photocurrents in the Weyl semimetal TaAs using terahertz (THz) emission spectroscopy. Our results reveal that highly directional, transient photocurrents are generated along the non-centrosymmetric c-axis regardless of incident light polarization, while helicity-dependent photocurrents are excited within the ab-plane. This is consistent with earlier static photocurrent experiments, and demonstrates on the basis of both the physical constraints imposed by symmetry and the temporal dynamics intrinsic to current generation and decay that optically i…
The generation of photocurrent in an ideal two-dimensional Dirac spectrum is symmetry-forbidden. In sharp contrast, we show that three-dimensional Weyl semimetals can generically support significant photocurrent generations due to the combination of inversion symmetry breaking and finite tilts of the Weyl spectra. Symmetry properties, chirality relations and various dependences on the system and light sources are explored in details. Our results suggest that noncentrosymmetric Weyl materials can be advantageously applied to room temperature detections of mid- and far-infrared radiations.
A new class of photocurrents is predicted to occur in both type-I and type-II Weyl semimetals. Unlike the previously studied photocurrents in chiral materials, the proposed current requires neither circularly polarized light, nor an absence of symmetry with respect to a plane of reflection. We show that if a Weyl semimetal has a broken inversion symmetry then linearly polarized light can induce a photocurrent transverse to the direction of an applied magnetic field, in spite of the symmetry with respect to a reflection plane and the time reversal symmetry. The class of materials in which we ex…
Weyl semimetals are crystals in which electron bands cross at isolated points in momentum space. Associated with each crossing point (or Weyl node) is an integer topological invariant known as the Berry monopole charge. The discovery of new classes of Weyl materials is driving the search for novel properties that derive directly from the Berry charge. The circular photogalvanic effect (CPGE), whereby circular polarized light generates a current whose direction depends on the helicity of the absorbed photons, is a striking example of a macroscopic property that emerges from Weyl topology. Recen…
We build a Cu-MoTe2-Cu device model and use first-principles density functional theory to study the transport properties of single-layer Td-MoTe2. We obtained the effect of strain on the energy band structure, transport properties, and photocurrent. The strain-induced photocurrent shows an anisotropy that reflects the modulation of the energy bands, including the Weyl point, by strain. The photocurrent can be suppressed to almost zero when the strain is applied along the vacuum direction. In contrast, the photocurrent can be significantly increased when the strain is applied along the transpor…
We study the second-order nonlinear optical response of a Weyl semimetal (WSM), i.e. a three-dimensional metal with linear band touchings acting as point-like sources of Berry curvature in momentum space, termed "Weyl-Berry monopoles". We first show that the anomalous second-order photocurrent of WSMs can be elegantly parametrized in terms of Weyl-Berry dipole and quadrupole moments. We then calculate the corresponding charge and node conductivities of WSMs with either broken time-reversal invariance or inversion symmetry. In particular, we predict a universal dissipationless second-order anom…
Theory of light absorption and circular photocurrent in Weyl semimetals is developed for arbitrary large light intensities with account for both elastic and inelastic relaxation processes of Weyl fermions. The direct optical transition rate is shown to saturate at large intensity, and the saturation behaviour depends on the light polarization and on the ratio of the elastic and inelastic relaxation times. The linear-circular dichroism in absorption is shown to exceed 10~\% at intermediate light wave amplitudes and fast energy relaxation. At large intensity $I$, the light absorption coefficient…
One of the hallmarks of light-spin interaction in solids is the appearance of photocurrent that depends on the light helicity. Recent studies have shown that helicity dependent photocurrent (HDP) emerges due to light induced spin current and the inverse spin Hall effect of semimetal thin films. We have studied HDP in metal/semimetal bilayers. Compared to Bi single layer films, we find the HDP is enhanced in metal/Bi bilayers. For the bilayers, the sign of HDP under back illumination reverses from that of front illumination. The back illumination photocurrent is the largest for Ag/Bi bilayers a…
The photovoltaic effect in a Weyl semimetal due to the adiabatic quantum phase is studied. We particularly focus on the case in which an external ac electric field is applied to the semimetal. In this setup, we show that a photocurrent is induced by the ac electric field. By considering a generalized Weyl Hamiltonian with nonlinear terms, it is shown that the photocurrent is induced by circularly, rather than linearly, polarized light. This photovoltaic current can be understood as an emergent electromagnetic induction in the momentum space; the Weyl node is a magnetic monopole in the momentum…
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…
The family of three-dimensional topological insulators opens new avenues to discover novel photophysics and to develop novel types of photodetectors. ZrTe5 has been shown to be a Dirac semimetal possessing unique topological electronic and optical properties. Here we present spatially-resolved photocurrent measurements on devices made of nanoplatelets of ZrTe5, demonstrating the photothermoelectric origin of the photoresponse. Due to the high electrical conductivity and good Seebeck coefficient, we obtain noise-equivalent powers as low as 42 pW/Hz1/2 at room temperature for visible light illum…
Photo sensing and energy harvesting based on exotic properties of quantum materials and new operation principles have great potentials to break the fundamental performance limit of conventional photodetectors and solar cells. As topological nontrivial materials, Weyl semimetals have demonstrated novel optoelectronic properties that promise potential applications in photo detection and energy harvesting arising from their gapless linear dispersion near Weyl nodes and Berry field enhanced nonlinear optical effect at the vicinity of Weyl nodes. In this work, we demonstrate robust photocurrent gen…
The circular photogalvanic effect (CPGE) is the photocurrent generated in an optically active material in response to an applied ac electric field, and it changes sign depending on the chirality of the incident circularly polarized light. It is a non-linear dc current as it is second-order in the applied electric field, and for a certain range of low frequencies, takes on a quantized value proportional to the topological charge for a system which is a source of nonzero Berry flux. We show that for a non-interacting double-Weyl node, the CPGE is proportional to two quanta of Berry flux. On exam…
We report on a room-temperature photodetector utilizing semimetal bismuth nanowire arrays coupled with graphene. The structural flatness and high electron mobility of graphene exhibit great potential for future generations of electronic materials. Bismuth nanowire arrays coupled with graphene have strong absorption because of light trapping. Bismuth (Bi), as a semimetal, complements graphene's gapless and mobility characteristics. Bi also features a long screening length (4 nm) comparable to semiconductors. Raman spectroscopy is used to characterize the charge transfer between graphene and Bi.…
Symmetry plays a central role in conventional and topological phases of matter, making the ability to optically drive symmetry change a critical step in developing future technologies that rely on such control. Topological materials, like the newly discovered topological semimetals, are particularly sensitive to a breaking or restoring of time-reversal and crystalline symmetries, which affect both bulk and surface electronic states. While previous studies have focused on controlling symmetry via coupling to the crystal lattice, we demonstrate here an all-electronic mechanism based on photocurr…
The chiral photocurrent or circular photogalvanic effect (CPGE) is a photocurrent that depends on the sense of circular polarization. In a disorder-free, noninteracting chiral Weyl semimetal, the magnitude of the effect is approximately quantized with a material-independent quantum $e^3/h^2$ for reasons of band topology. We study the first-order corrections due to the Coulomb and Hubbard interactions in a continuum model of a Weyl semimetal in which known corrections from other bands are absent. We find that the inclusion of interactions generically breaks the quantization. The corrections are…
We have studied theoretically the Weyl semimetals the point symmetry group of which has reflection planes and which contain equivalent valleys with opposite chiralities. These include the most frequently studied compounds, namely the transition metals monopnictides TaAs, NbAs, TaP, NbP, and also Bi$_{1-x}$Sb$_x$ alloys. The circular photogalvanic current, which inverts its direction under reversal of the light circular polarization, has been calculated for the light absorption under direct optical transitions near the Weyl points. In the studied materials, the total contribution of all the val…
We theoretically study the impact of impurities on the photogalvanic effect (PGE) in Weyl semimetals with weakly tilted Weyl cones. Our calculations are based on a two-nodes model with an inversion symmetry breaking offset and we employ a kinetic equation approach in which both optical transitions as well as particle-hole excitations near the Fermi energy can be taken into account. We focus on the parameter regime with a single photoactive node and control the calculation in small impurity concentration. Internode scattering is treated generically and therefore our results allow to continuousl…
We study the low-frequency properties of the bulk photovoltaic effect in topological semimetals. The bulk photovoltaic effect is a nonlinear optical effect that generates DC photocurrents under uniform irradiation, allowed by noncentrosymmetry. It is a promising mechanism for a terahertz photodetection based on topological semimetals. Here, we systematically investigate the low-frequency behavior of the second-order optical conductivity in point-node semimetals. Through symmetry and power-counting analysis, we show that Dirac and Weyl points with tilted cones show the leading low-frequency div…
The recent discovery of the quantum nonlinear Hall effect has revived the field of nonlinear transport. Here, we predict magnetic field-induced nonlinear Hall effect in time-reversal symmetric Weyl semimetal. We show that the interplay of the band geometric quantities, such as the Berry curvature, and the magnetic part of the Lorentz force can give rise to finite nonlinear Hall conductivity that is linear in the magnetic field. Such nonlinear Hall conductivity can manifest through nonlinear transport measurement as well as nonlinear optical phenomena like photocurrent and the second harmonic g…
Weyl semimetals are gapless topological states of matter with broken inversion and/or time reversal symmetry, which can support unconventional responses to externally applied electrical, optical and magnetic fields. Here we report a new photogalvanic effect in type-II WSMs, MoTe2 and Mo0.9W0.1Te2, which are observed to support a circulating photocurrent when illuminated by circularly polarized light at normal incidence. This effect occurs exclusively in the inversion broken phase, where crucially we find that it is associated with a spatially varying beam profile via a new dispersive contribut…
The nonlinear optical responses from topological semimetals are crucial in both understanding the fundamental properties of quantum materials and designing next-generation light-sensors or solar-cells. However, previous work was focusing on the optical effects from bulk states only, disregarding topological surface responses. Here we propose a new (hitherto unknown) surface-only topological photocurrent response from chiral Fermi arcs. Using the ideal topological chiral semimetal RhSi as a representative, we quantitatively compute the topologically robust photocurrents from Fermi arcs on diffe…
Using first-principles calculations, we investigate the photogalvanic effect in the Weyl semimetal material TaAs. We find colossal photocurrents caused by the Weyl points in the band structuure in a wide range of laser frequency. Our calculations reveal that the photocurrent is predominantly contributed by the three-band transition from the occupied Weyl band to the empty Weyl band via an intermediate band away from the Weyl cone, for excitations both by linearly and circularly polarized lights. Therefore, it is significant to sum over all three-band transitions by considering a full set of Bl…
Circularly polarized light (CPL) can induce an asymmetry between the number of left- and right-handed chiral quasiparticles in Dirac and Weyl semimetals. We show that if the photoresponse of the material is dominated by chiral quasiparticles, the total chiral charge induced in the material by CPL can be evaluated in a model-independent way through the chiral anomaly. In the presence of an external magnetic field perpendicular to the incident CPL, this allows to predict the linear density of the induced photocurrent resulting from the chiral magnetic effect. The predicted effect should exist in…
The absence of mirror symmetry, or chirality, is behind striking natural phenomena found in systems as diverse as DNA and crystalline solids. A remarkable example occurs when chiral semimetals with topologically protected band degeneracies are illuminated with circularly polarized light. Under the right conditions, the part of the generated photocurrent that switches sign upon reversal of the light's polarization, known as the circular photogalvanic effect, is predicted to depend only on fundamental constants. The conditions to observe quantization are non-universal, and depend on material par…
A Weyl semimetal (WSM) is a novel topological phase of matter, in which Weyl fermions (WFs) arise as pseudo-magnetic monopoles in its momentum space. The chirality of the WFs, given by the sign of the monopole charge, is central to the Weyl physics, since it directly serves as the sign of the topological number and gives rise to exotic properties such as Fermi arcs and the chiral anomaly. Despite being the defining property of a WSM, the chirality of the WFs has never been experimentally measured. Here, we directly detect the chirality of the WFs by measuring the photocurrent in response to ci…
It has recently been realized that the first-order moment of the Berry curvature, namely the Berry curvature dipole (BCD) can give rise to non-linear current in a wide variety of time-reversal invariant and non-centrosymmetric materials. While the BCD in two-dimensional Dirac systems is known to be finite only in the presence of either substantial spin-orbit coupling where low-energy Dirac quasiparticles form tilted cones or higher order warping of the Fermi surface, we argue that the low-energy Dirac quasiparticles arising from the merging of a pair of Dirac points without any tilt or warping…
Weyl semimetals (WSM) have been discovered in time-reversal symmetric materials, featuring monopoles of Berry's curvature in momentum space. WSM have been distinguished between Type-I and II where the velocity tilting of the cone in the later ensures a finite area Fermi surface. To date it has not been clear whether the two types results in any qualitatively new phenomena. Here we focus on the shift-current response ($σ_{shift}(ω)$), a second order optical effect generating photocurrents. Surprisingly we find that up to an order unity constant, $σ_{shift}(ω)\sim \frac{e^3}{h^2}\frac{1}ω$ in Ty…
The efforts to pursue photo detection with extreme performance in terms of ultrafast response time, broad detection wavelength range, and high sensitivity have never been exhausted as driven by its wide range of optoelectronic and photonic applications such as optical communications, interconnects, imaging and remote sensing1. 2D Dirac semimetal graphene has shown excellent potential toward high performance photodetector with high operation speed, broadband response and efficient carrier multiplications benefiting from its linear dispersion band structure with high carrier mobility and zero ba…
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…
Weyl semimetal (WSM) is expected to be an ideal spintronic material owing to its spin currents carried by the bulk and surface states with spin-momentum locking. A photocurrent generation in noncentrosymmetric WSM was also predicted owing to its broken inversion symmetry and linear energy dispersion which are unique to Weyl systems. In our recent measurements, the circular photogalvanic effect (CPGE) has been demonstrated in WSM of TaAs. The CPGE voltage is proportional to the helicity of the incident light and reverses its direction on changing the radiation helicity from left handed to right…
