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Title: Spectroscopic evidence for bulk-band inversion and three-dimensional massive Dirac fermions in ZrTe5

Journal Article · · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [3];  [3];  [3];  [4];  [5]; ORCiD logo [3];  [3];  [6]
  1. Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Beijing (China)
  2. Peking Univ., Beijing (China)
  3. Brookhaven National Lab. (BNL), Upton, NY (United States)
  4. Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Beijing (China); Delft Univ. of Technology, Delft (The Netherlands)
  5. Wuhan Univ., Wuhan (China)
  6. Peking Univ., Beijing (China); Collaborative Innovation Center of Quantum Matter, Beijing (China)

Three-dimensional topological insulators (3D TIs) represent states of quantum matters in which surface states are protected by time-reversal symmetry and an inversion occurs between bulk conduction and valence bands. However, the bulk-band inversion, which is intimately tied to the topologically nontrivial nature of 3D Tis, has rarely been investigated by experiments. Besides, 3D massive Dirac fermions with nearly linear band dispersions were seldom observed in TIs. Recently, a van der Waals crystal, ZrTe5, was theoretically predicted to be a TI. Here, we report an infrared transmission study of a high-mobility [~33,000 cm2/(V • s)] multilayer ZrTe5 flake at magnetic fields (B) up to 35 T. Our observation of a linear relationship between the zero-magnetic-field optical absorption and the photon energy, a bandgap of ~10 meV and a √B dependence of the Landau level (LL) transition energies at low magnetic fields demonstrates 3D massive Dirac fermions with nearly linear band dispersions in this system. More importantly, the reemergence of the intra-LL transitions at magnetic fields higher than 17 T reveals the energy cross between the two zeroth LLs, which reflects the inversion between the bulk conduction and valence bands. Finally, our results not only provide spectroscopic evidence for the TI state in ZrTe5 but also open up a new avenue for fundamental studies of Dirac fermions in van der Waals materials.

Research Organization:
Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), Upton, NY (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES) (SC-22)
OSTI ID:
1354629
Report Number(s):
BNL--113757-2017-JA; KC0201060
Journal Information:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Journal Name: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Journal Issue: 5 Vol. 114; ISSN 0027-8424
Publisher:
National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC (United States)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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Thickness-Dependent In-Plane Thermal Conductivity and Enhanced Thermoelectric Performance in p-Type ZrTe 5 Nanoribbons journal November 2018
Vanishing quantum oscillations in Dirac semimetal ZrTe 5 journal August 2018
Optical signatures of Dirac nodal lines in NbAs 2 journal December 2018
Experimental progress on layered topological semimetals journal April 2019
Optical spectroscopy study of the topological property in PrSb journal September 2019
Thermoelectric transport coefficients of a Dirac electron gas in high magnetic fields journal October 2019
Thickness-tuned transition of band topology in ZrT e 5 nanosheets journal March 2017
Magnetoresistance of a three-dimensional Dirac gas journal November 2018
Ultrafast hot carrier dynamics of ZrTe 5 from time-resolved optical reflectivity journal March 2019
Detection of sub-MeV dark matter with three-dimensional Dirac materials journal January 2018
Disruption of the Accidental Dirac Semimetal State in ZrTe 5 under Hydrostatic Pressure journal May 2017
Negative Longitudinal Magnetoresistance from the Anomalous N = 0 Landau Level in Topological Materials journal September 2017
Temperature-Driven Topological Phase Transition and Intermediate Dirac Semimetal Phase in ZrTe 5 journal October 2018
Two-Dimensional Conical Dispersion in ZrTe 5 Evidenced by Optical Spectroscopy journal May 2019
Magnetization-Induced Band Shift in Ferromagnetic Weyl Semimetal Co 3 Sn 2 S 2 journal February 2020
Magneto-optical probe of the fully gapped Dirac band in ZrSiS journal November 2019
Unraveling the topology of ZrTe 5 by changing temperature journal December 2019
Evidence for a strain-tuned topological phase transition in ZrTe 5 journal August 2019
Optical Signatures of Dirac Nodal-lines in NbAs$_2$ text January 2018
Evidence for a strain tuned topological phase transition in ZrTe5 text January 2018
Experimental Progress on Layered Topological Semimetals text January 2019
Thermoelectric transport coefficients of a Dirac electron gas in high magnetic fields text January 2019
Magneto-optical probe of the fully gapped Dirac band in ZrSiS text January 2019