Shi-Han Zheng

Resonance states and beating pattern induced by quantum impurity scattering in Weyl/Dirac semimetals

Currently, Weyl semimetals (WSMs) are drawing great interest as a new topological nontrivial phase. When most of the studies concentrated on the clean host WSMs, it is expected that the dirty WSM system would present rich physics due to the interplay between the WSM states and the impurities embedded inside these materials. We investigate theoretically the change of local density of states in three-dimensional Dirac and Weyl bulk states scattered off a quantum impurity. It is found that the quantum impurity scattering can create nodal resonance and Kondo peak/dip in the host bulk states, remarkably modifying the pristine spectrum structure. Moreover, the joint effect of the separation of Weyl nodes and the Friedel interference oscillation causes the unique battering feature. We in detail an- alyze the different contribution from the intra- and inter-node scattering processes and present various scenarios as a consequence of competition between them. Importantly, these behaviors are sensitive significantly to the displacement of Weyl nodes in energy or momentum, from which the distinctive fingerprints can be extracted to identify various semimetal materials experimentally by employing the scanning tunneling microscope.

Majorana fermion realization and relevant transport processes in a triple-quantum dot system

Nonequilibrium electronic transports through a system hosting three quantum dots hybridized with superconductors are investigated. By tuning the relative positions of the dot levels, we illustrate the existence of Majorana fermions and show that the Majorana feimions will either survive separately on single dots or distribute themselves among different dots with tunable probabilities. As a result, different physical mechanisms appear, including local Andreev reflection (LAR), cross Andreev reflection (CAR), and cross resonant tunneling (CRT). The resulting characteristics may be used to reveal the unique properties of Majorana fermions. In addition, we discuss the spin-polarized transports and find a pure spin current and a spin filter effect due to the joint effect of CRT and CAR, which is important for designing spintronic devices.

A new self-filling mechanism of band gap in magnetically doped topological surface states: spin-flipping inelastic scattering

We investigate the influence of in-plane spin-exchange interactions on a topological insulator (TI) surface doped with nanomagnets under the second perturbation theory. We propose a novel self-filling mechanism of the surface-state band gap. It is found that when the out-of-plane exchange coupling favors an energy gap around the Dirac point, the in-plane component tends to suppress the induced gap, and even fill it completely. Our theory is based on the spin-flipping inelastic scattering, which creates a complex structure of self-energy, effectively modifying the band gap by renormalizing the magnetic moment and chemical potential. We explicitly analyze the filling effect in the electronic dispersion relation and density of states for different scenarios set by systemic parameters. This self-filling effect induced by spin-exchange coupling itself opens new perspectives for understanding of various magnetically doping phenomena on the TI materials and is expected to mediate the controversy concerning the magnetically doping induced gap.

Thermally driven transverse transports and magnetic dynamics on a topological surface capped with a ferromagnet strip

We theoretically study thermally driven transport of the Dirac fermions on the surface of a topological insulator capped with a ferromagnet strip. The generation and manipulation of anomalous Hall and Nernst effects are analyzed, in which the in-plane magnetization of the ferromagnet film is found to take a decisive role. This scenario is distinct from that modulated by Berry phase where the in-plane magnetization is independent. We further discuss the thermal spin-transfer torque as a backaction of the thermoelectric transports on the magnetization and calculate the dynamics of the anomalous Hall and Nernst effects self-consistently. It is found that the magnitude of the long-time steady Hall and Nernst conductance is determined by competition between the magnetic anisotropy and current-induced effective anisotropy. These results open up a possibility of magnetically controlling the transverse thermoelectric transports or thermally manipulating the magnet switching.

Electrical manipulation of dynamic magnetic impurity and spin texture of helical Dirac fermions

We have theoretically investigated the spin inelastic scattering of helical electrons off a high-spin nanomagnet absorbed on a topological surface. The nanomagnet is treated as a dynamic quantum spin and driven by the spin transfer torque effect. We proposed a mechanism to electrically manipulate the spin texture of helical Dirac fermions rather than by an external magnetic field. By tuning the bias voltage and the direction of impurity magnetization, we present rich patterns of spin texture, from which important fingerprints exclusively associated with the spin helical feature are obtained. Furthermore, it is found that the nonmagnetic potential can create the resonance state in the spin density with different physics as the previously reported resonance of charge density.

Bulk RKKY signatures of topological phase transition in silicene

Silicene offers an ideal platform for exploring the phase transition due to strong spin-orbit interaction and its unique structure with strong tunability. With applied electric field and circularly polarized light, silicone is predicted to exhibit rich phases. We propose that these intricate phase transitions can be detected by measuring the bulk Ruderman-Kittel-Kasuya-Yosida (RKKY) interaction. We have in detail analyzed the dependence of RKKY interaction on phase parameters for different impurity configurations along zigzag direction. Importantly, we present an interesting comparison between different terms of RKKY interaction with phase diagram. It is found that the in-plane and out-of-plane terms can exhibit the local extreme value or change of sign at the phase critical point and remarkable difference in magnitude for different phase regions. Consequently, the magnetic measurement provides unambiguous signatures to identify various types of phase transition simultaneously, which can be carried out with present technique.