Controlling symmetry and topology via bicircular light: application to Cd<sub>3</sub>As<sub>2</sub>

ORAL

Abstract

Light-matter interaction is a powerful tool to manipulate electronic properties of materials. Of particular interest are intense periodic light fields, which can be carefully tailored to dynamically manipulate materials’ properties via control of symmetry and band topology. A particularly versatile and less explored way of such Floquet engineering is to use a bicircular light, which is a superposition of two circularly polarized lights of different frequencies that are integer multiples of each other. In bicircular light, the electric field traces out a Lissajous figure in real space, which opens the intriguing possibility to precisely control spatial and magnetic symmetries, in addition to time-reversal symmetry. We apply bicircular light tuning to the Dirac semimetal Cd3As2 and demonstrate that the material can be driven into different Weyl semimetal phases, with interesting consequences on the protected surface states.

*Work supported by the Center for the Advancement of Topological Semimetals, an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. DOE Office of Science, Office of BES, through Ames Laboratory under its Contract No. DE-AC02-07CH11358.

–

Presenters

  • Thais Victa Trevisan

    • Ames Lab
    • Department of Physics and Astronomy, Iowa State University/Ames Laboratory
    • Ames Laboratory, Iowa State University

Authors

  • Thais Victa Trevisan

    • Ames Lab
    • Department of Physics and Astronomy, Iowa State University/Ames Laboratory
    • Ames Laboratory, Iowa State University

  • Pablo Villar Arribi

    • Argonne National Laboratory

  • Olle Heinonen

    • Argonne National Lab
    • Argonne National Laboratory
    • Division of Materials Science and Engineering, Argonne National Laboratory
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory

  • Robert-Jan Slager

    • University of Cambridge
    • TCM Group, Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge
    • TCM Group, Cavendish Laboratory/ Department of Physics, University of Cambridge/ Harvard University
    • Harvard University

  • Peter Orth

    • Department of Physics and Astronomy, Ames Laboratory, Iowa State University
    • Iowa State University
    • Department of Physics and Astronomy, Iowa State University/Ames Laboratory
    • Ames Laboratory, Iowa State University