Emergence of non-centrosymmetric topological insulating phase in BiTeI under pressure
| Autor: | Bahramy, M. S., Yang, B. -J., Arita, R., Nagaosa, N. |
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| Rok vydání: | 2011 |
| Předmět: | |
| Zdroj: | Nature Communications 3, 679 (2012) |
| Druh dokumentu: | Working Paper |
| DOI: | 10.1038/ncomms1679 |
| Popis: | The spin-orbit interaction affects the electronic structure of solids in various ways. Topological insulators are one example where the spin-orbit interaction leads the bulk bands to have a non-trivial topology, observable as gapless surface or edge states. Another example is the Rashba effect, which lifts the electron-spin degeneracy as a consequence of spin-orbit interaction under broken inversion symmetry. It is of particular importance to know how these two effects, i.e. the non-trivial topology of electronic states and Rashba spin splitting, interplay with each other. Here we show, through sophisticated first-principles calculations, that BiTeI, a giant bulk Rashba semiconductor, turns into a topological insulator under a reasonable pressure. This material is shown to exhibit several unique features such as, a highly pressure-tunable giant Rashba spin splitting, an unusual pressure-induced quantum phase transition, and more importantly the formation of strikingly different Dirac surface states at opposite sides of the material. Comment: 5 figures are included |
| Databáze: | arXiv |
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