Bicircular Light Floquet Engineering of Magnetic Symmetry and Topology and Its Application to the Dirac Semimetal Cd3As2

Here, we show that bicircular light (BCL) is a versatile way to control magnetic symmetries and topology in materials. The electric field of BCL, which is a superposition of two circularly polarized light waves with frequencies that are integer multiples of each other, traces out a rose pattern in t...

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Veröffentlicht in:Physical review letters 2022-02, Vol.128 (6)
Hauptverfasser: Trevisan, Thaís V., Arribi, Pablo Villar, Heinonen, Olle, Slager, Robert-Jan, Orth, Peter P.
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Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:Here, we show that bicircular light (BCL) is a versatile way to control magnetic symmetries and topology in materials. The electric field of BCL, which is a superposition of two circularly polarized light waves with frequencies that are integer multiples of each other, traces out a rose pattern in the polarization plane that can be chosen to break selective symmetries, including spatial inversion. Using a realistic low-energy model, we theoretically demonstrate that the three-dimensional Dirac semimetal Cd3As2 is a promising platform for BCL Floquet engineering. Without strain, BCL irradiation induces a transition to a noncentrosymmetric magnetic Weyl semimetal phase with tunable energy separation between the Weyl nodes. In the presence of strain, we predict the emergence of a magnetic topological crystalline insulator with exotic unpinned surface Dirac states that are protected by a combination of twofold rotation and time reversal (2') and can be controlled by light.
ISSN:0031-9007
1079-7114
DOI:10.1103/PhysRevLett.128.066602