Spin Polarization and Texture of the Fermi Arcs in the Weyl Fermion Semimetal TaAs
Abstract
A Weyl semimetal is a new state of matter that hosts Weyl fermions as quasiparticle excitations. The Weyl fermions at zero energy correspond to points of bulk-band degeneracy, called Weyl nodes, which are separated in momentum space and are connected only through the crystal’s boundary by an exotic Fermi arc surface state. Here, we experimentally measure the spin polarization of the Fermi arcs in the first experimentally discovered Weyl semimetal TaAs. Our spin data, for the first time, reveal that the Fermi arcs’ spin-polarization magnitude is as large as 80% and lies completely in the plane of the surface. Moreover, we demonstrate that the chirality of the Weyl nodes in TaAs cannot be inferred by the spin texture of the Fermi arcs. The observed nondegenerate property of the Fermi arcs is important for establishing its exact topological nature, which reveals that spins on the arc form a novel type of 2D matter. In addition, the nearly full spin polarization we observed (~80%) may be useful in spintronic applications.
- Authors:
-
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- Princeton Univ., NJ (United States). Dept. of Physics, Lab. for Topological Quantum Matter and Spectroscopy
- Princeton Univ., NJ (United States). Dept. of Physics, Lab. for Topological Quantum Matter and Spectroscopy; Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States). Condensed Matter and Magnet Science Group; Univ. of Central Florida, Orlando, FL (United States). Dept. of Physics
- Centre for Advanced 2D Materials and Graphene Research Centre National Univ. of Singapore (Singapore); National Univ. of Singapore (Singapore). Dept. of Physics
- Univ of Tokyo, Chiba (Japan). Inst. for Solid State Physics (ISSP)
- Peking Univ., Beijing (China). International Center for Quantum Materials, School of Physics
- National Tsing Hua Univ., Hsinchu (Taiwan). Dept. of Physics
- National Tsing Hua Univ., Hsinchu (Taiwan). Dept. of Physics; Academia Sinica, Taipei (Taiwan). Inst. of Physics
- Northeastern Univ., Boston, MA (United States). Dept. of Physics
- Princeton Univ., NJ (United States). Joseph Henry lab., Dept. of Physics
- Peking Univ., Beijing (China). International Center for Quantum Materials, School of Physics; Collaborative Innovation Center of Quantum Matter, Beijing (China)
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1414083
- Alternate Identifier(s):
- OSTI ID: 1239862
- Report Number(s):
- LA-UR-15-28623
Journal ID: ISSN 0031-9007; PRLTAO; TRN: US1800618
- Grant/Contract Number:
- AC52-06NA25396; FG02-07ER46352; AC02-05CH11231; FG-02-05ER46200
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Physical Review Letters
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 116; Journal Issue: 9; Journal ID: ISSN 0031-9007
- Publisher:
- American Physical Society (APS)
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS; 75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY
Citation Formats
Xu, Su-Yang, Belopolski, Ilya, Sanchez, Daniel S., Neupane, Madhab, Chang, Guoqing, Yaji, Koichiro, Yuan, Zhujun, Zhang, Chenglong, Kuroda, Kenta, Bian, Guang, Guo, Cheng, Lu, Hong, Chang, Tay-Rong, Alidoust, Nasser, Zheng, Hao, Lee, Chi-Cheng, Huang, Shin-Ming, Hsu, Chuang-Han, Jeng, Horng-Tay, Bansil, Arun, Neupert, Titus, Komori, Fumio, Kondo, Takeshi, Shin, Shik, Lin, Hsin, Jia, Shuang, and Hasan, M. Zahid. Spin Polarization and Texture of the Fermi Arcs in the Weyl Fermion Semimetal TaAs. United States: N. p., 2016.
Web. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.096801.
Xu, Su-Yang, Belopolski, Ilya, Sanchez, Daniel S., Neupane, Madhab, Chang, Guoqing, Yaji, Koichiro, Yuan, Zhujun, Zhang, Chenglong, Kuroda, Kenta, Bian, Guang, Guo, Cheng, Lu, Hong, Chang, Tay-Rong, Alidoust, Nasser, Zheng, Hao, Lee, Chi-Cheng, Huang, Shin-Ming, Hsu, Chuang-Han, Jeng, Horng-Tay, Bansil, Arun, Neupert, Titus, Komori, Fumio, Kondo, Takeshi, Shin, Shik, Lin, Hsin, Jia, Shuang, & Hasan, M. Zahid. Spin Polarization and Texture of the Fermi Arcs in the Weyl Fermion Semimetal TaAs. United States. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.096801
Xu, Su-Yang, Belopolski, Ilya, Sanchez, Daniel S., Neupane, Madhab, Chang, Guoqing, Yaji, Koichiro, Yuan, Zhujun, Zhang, Chenglong, Kuroda, Kenta, Bian, Guang, Guo, Cheng, Lu, Hong, Chang, Tay-Rong, Alidoust, Nasser, Zheng, Hao, Lee, Chi-Cheng, Huang, Shin-Ming, Hsu, Chuang-Han, Jeng, Horng-Tay, Bansil, Arun, Neupert, Titus, Komori, Fumio, Kondo, Takeshi, Shin, Shik, Lin, Hsin, Jia, Shuang, and Hasan, M. Zahid. Tue .
"Spin Polarization and Texture of the Fermi Arcs in the Weyl Fermion Semimetal TaAs". United States. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.096801. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1414083.
@article{osti_1414083,
title = {Spin Polarization and Texture of the Fermi Arcs in the Weyl Fermion Semimetal TaAs},
author = {Xu, Su-Yang and Belopolski, Ilya and Sanchez, Daniel S. and Neupane, Madhab and Chang, Guoqing and Yaji, Koichiro and Yuan, Zhujun and Zhang, Chenglong and Kuroda, Kenta and Bian, Guang and Guo, Cheng and Lu, Hong and Chang, Tay-Rong and Alidoust, Nasser and Zheng, Hao and Lee, Chi-Cheng and Huang, Shin-Ming and Hsu, Chuang-Han and Jeng, Horng-Tay and Bansil, Arun and Neupert, Titus and Komori, Fumio and Kondo, Takeshi and Shin, Shik and Lin, Hsin and Jia, Shuang and Hasan, M. Zahid},
abstractNote = {A Weyl semimetal is a new state of matter that hosts Weyl fermions as quasiparticle excitations. The Weyl fermions at zero energy correspond to points of bulk-band degeneracy, called Weyl nodes, which are separated in momentum space and are connected only through the crystal’s boundary by an exotic Fermi arc surface state. Here, we experimentally measure the spin polarization of the Fermi arcs in the first experimentally discovered Weyl semimetal TaAs. Our spin data, for the first time, reveal that the Fermi arcs’ spin-polarization magnitude is as large as 80% and lies completely in the plane of the surface. Moreover, we demonstrate that the chirality of the Weyl nodes in TaAs cannot be inferred by the spin texture of the Fermi arcs. The observed nondegenerate property of the Fermi arcs is important for establishing its exact topological nature, which reveals that spins on the arc form a novel type of 2D matter. In addition, the nearly full spin polarization we observed (~80%) may be useful in spintronic applications.},
doi = {10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.096801},
journal = {Physical Review Letters},
number = 9,
volume = 116,
place = {United States},
year = {Tue Mar 01 00:00:00 EST 2016},
month = {Tue Mar 01 00:00:00 EST 2016}
}
Web of Science
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