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Spin-orbit quantum impurity in a topological magnet.

ABSTRACT: Quantum states induced by single-atomic impurities are at the frontier of physics and material science. While such states have been reported in high-temperature superconductors and dilute magnetic semiconductors, they are unexplored in topological magnets which can feature spin-orbit tunability. Here we use spin-polarized scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy (STM/S) to study the engineered quantum impurity in a topological magnet Co3Sn2S2. We find that each substituted In impurity introduces a striking localized bound state. Our systematic magnetization-polarized probe reveals that this bound state is spin-down polarized, in lock with a negative orbital magnetization. Moreover, the magnetic bound states of neighboring impurities interact to form quantized orbitals, exhibiting an intriguing spin-orbit splitting, analogous to the splitting of the topological fermion line. Our work collectively demonstrates the strong spin-orbit effect of the single-atomic impurity at the quantum level, suggesting that a nonmagnetic impurity can introduce spin-orbit coupled magnetic resonance in topological magnets.

SUBMITTER: Yin JX

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7474094 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Spin-orbit quantum impurity in a topological magnet.

Yin Jia-Xin JX Shumiya Nana N Jiang Yuxiao Y Zhou Huibin H Macam Gennevieve G Sura Hano Omar Mohammad HOM Zhang Songtian S SS Cheng Zi-Jia ZJ Guguchia Zurab Z Guguchia Zurab Z Li Yangmu Y Wang Qi Q Litskevich Maksim M Belopolski Ilya I Yang Xian P XP Cochran Tyler A TA Chang Guoqing G Zhang Qi Q Huang Zhi-Quan ZQ Chuang Feng-Chuan FC Lin Hsin H Lei Hechang H Andersen Brian M BM Wang Ziqiang Z Jia Shuang S Hasan M Zahid MZ

Nature communications 20200904 1

Quantum states induced by single-atomic impurities are at the frontier of physics and material science. While such states have been reported in high-temperature superconductors and dilute magnetic semiconductors, they are unexplored in topological magnets which can feature spin-orbit tunability. Here we use spin-polarized scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy (STM/S) to study the engineered quantum impurity in a topological magnet Co3Sn2S2. We find that each ...[more]

PMID: 32887890

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Project description:Topological materials have attracted considerable experimental and theoretical attention. They exhibit strong spin-orbit coupling both in the band structure (intrinsic) and in the impurity potentials (extrinsic), although the latter is often neglected. In this work, we discuss weak localization and antilocalization of massless Dirac fermions in topological insulators and massive Dirac fermions in Weyl semimetal thin films, taking into account both intrinsic and extrinsic spin-orbit interactions. The physics is governed by the complex interplay of the chiral spin texture, quasiparticle mass, and scalar and spin-orbit scattering. We demonstrate that terms linear in the extrinsic spin-orbit scattering are generally present in the Bloch and momentum relaxation times in all topological materials, and the correction to the diffusion constant is linear in the strength of the extrinsic spin-orbit. In topological insulators, which have zero quasiparticle mass, the terms linear in the impurity spin-orbit coupling lead to an observable density dependence in the weak antilocalization correction. They produce substantial qualitative modifications to the magnetoconductivity, differing greatly from the conventional Hikami-Larkin-Nagaoka formula traditionally used in experimental fits, which predicts a crossover from weak localization to antilocalization as a function of the extrinsic spin-orbit strength. In contrast, our analysis reveals that topological insulators always exhibit weak antilocalization. In Weyl semimetal thin films having intermediate to large values of the quasiparticle mass, we show that extrinsic spin-orbit scattering strongly affects the boundary of the weak localization to antilocalization transition. We produce a complete phase diagram for this transition as a function of the mass and spin-orbit scattering strength. Throughout the paper, we discuss implications for experimental work, and, at the end, we provide a brief comparison with transition metal dichalcogenides.

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Spin-orbit quantum impurity in a topological magnet.

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Spin-orbit quantum impurity in a topological magnet.

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