Motoaki Hirayama

Weyl Node and Spin Texture in Trigonal Tellurium and Selenium.

We study Weyl nodes in materials with broken inversion symmetry. We find based on first-principles calculations that trigonal Te and Se have multiple Weyl nodes near the Fermi level. The conduction bands have a spin splitting similar to the Rashba splitting around the H points, but unlike the Rashba splitting the spin directions are radial, forming a hedgehog spin texture around the H points, with a nonzero Pontryagin index for each spin-split conduction band. The Weyl semimetal phase, which has never been observed in real materials without inversion symmetry, is realized under pressure. The evolution of the spin texture by varying the pressure can be explained by the evolution of the Weyl nodes in k space.

Topological Dirac nodal lines and surface charges in fcc alkaline earth metals

In nodal-line semimetals, the gaps close along loops in k space, which are not at high-symmetry points. Typical mechanisms for the emergence of nodal lines involve mirror symmetry and the π Berry phase. Here we show via ab initio calculations that fcc calcium (Ca), strontium (Sr) and ytterbium (Yb) have topological nodal lines with the π Berry phase near the Fermi level, when spin–orbit interaction is neglected. In particular, Ca becomes a nodal-line semimetal at high pressure. Owing to nodal lines, the Zak phase becomes either π or 0, depending on the wavevector k, and the π Zak phase leads to surface polarization charge. Carriers eventually screen it, leaving behind large surface dipoles. In materials with nodal lines, both the large surface polarization charge and the emergent drumhead surface states enhance Rashba splitting when heavy adatoms are present, as we have shown to occur in Bi/Sr(111) and in Bi/Ag(111).

Derivation of static low-energy effective models by anab initiodownfolding method without double counting of Coulomb correlations: Application to SrVO3, FeSe, and FeTe

Derivation of low-energy effective models by a partial trace summation of the electronic degrees of freedom far away from the Fermi level, called downfolding, is reexamined. We propose an improved formalism free from the double counting of electron correlation in the low-energy degrees of freedom. In this approach, the exchange-correlation energy in the local-density approximation (LDA) is replaced with the

Emergence of topological semimetals in gap closing in semiconductors without inversion symmetry

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13C NMR Study on Zero-Gap State in the Organic Conductor θ-(BEDT-TTF)2I3 under Pressure

self-energy; herewith its low-energy part associated with the double counting is subtracted. Moreover, in our formalism, the frequency dependence of the effective parameter is renormalized into the static one. We apply the formalism to SrVO

Ab initio Low-Energy Model of Transition-Metal-Oxide Heterostructure LaAlO3/SrTiO3

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Spinless Hourglass Nodal-line Semimetals

as well as to two iron-based superconductors, FeSe and FeTe. The resultant bandwidths of the effective models are nearly the same as those of the previous downfolding formalism because of striking cancellations between an increase arising from the exclusion of the low-energy correlation and a shrinking arising from the renormalization of the frequency dependence. In the nondegenerate multiband materials such as FeSe and FeTe, the momentum dependent self-energy effects yield substantial modifications of the band structures and relative shifts of orbital-energy levels of the effective models, which may explain the stability of the bicollinear antiferromagnetic phase in FeTe as well as the experimental absence of the antiferromagnetic phase in FeSe.

Ab initio Studies of Magnetism in the Iron Chalcogenides FeTe and FeSe

Closing of a band gap of inversion-asymmetric semiconductors always leads either to a Weyl semimetal or to a nodal-line semimetal A band gap for electronic states in crystals governs various properties of solids, such as transport, optical, and magnetic properties. Its estimation and control have been an important issue in solid-state physics. The band gap can be controlled externally by various parameters, such as pressure, atomic compositions, and external field. Sometimes, the gap even collapses by tuning some parameter. In the field of topological insulators, this closing of the gap at a time-reversal invariant momentum indicates a band inversion, that is, it leads to a topological phase transition from a normal insulator to a topological insulator. We show, through an exhaustive study on possible space groups, that the gap closing in inversion-asymmetric crystals is universal, in the sense that the gap closing always leads either to a Weyl semimetal or to a nodal-line semimetal. We consider three-dimensional spinful systems with time-reversal symmetry. The space group of the system and the wave vector at the gap closing uniquely determine which possibility occurs and where the gap-closing points or lines lie in the wave vector space after the closing of the gap. In particular, we show that an insulator-to-insulator transition never happens, which is in sharp contrast to inversion-symmetric systems.

Topological Semimetals Studied by Ab Initio Calculations

We present the results of our

Systematic Control of Doped Carrier Density without Disorder at Interface of Oxide Heterostructures

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