Fermi-Edge Resonance and Tunneling in Nonequilibrium Electron Gas

Fermi-edge singularity changes in a dramatic way in a nonequilibrium system, acquiring features which reflect the structure of energy distribution. In particular, it splits into several components if the energy distribution exhibits multiple steps. While conventional approaches, such as bosonization, fail to describe the nonequilibrium problem, an exact solution for a generic energy distribution can be obtained with the help of the method of functional determinants. In the case of a split Fermi distribution, while the `open loop' contribution to Green's function has power law singularities, the tunneling density of states profile exhibits broadened peaks centered at Fermi sub-levels.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figur

Peierls-type Instability and Tunable Band Gap in Functionalized Graphene

Functionalizing graphene was recently shown to have a dramatic effect on the electronic properties of this material. Here we investigate spatial ordering of adatoms driven by the RKKY-type interactions. In the ordered state, which arises via a Peierls-instability-type mechanism, the adatoms reside mainly on one of the two graphene sublattices. Bragg scattering of electron waves induced by sublattice symmetry breaking results in a band gap opening, whereby Dirac fermions acquire a finite mass. The band gap is found to be immune to the adatoms' positional disorder, with only an exponentially small number of localized states residing in the gap. The gapped state is stabilized in a wide range of electron doping. Our findings show that controlled adsorption of adatoms or molecules provides a route to engineering a tunable band gap in graphene.Comment: 6 pgs, 3 fg

Interaction-driven topological insulator states in strained graphene

The electronic properties of graphene can be manipulated via mechanical deformations, which opens prospects for studying the Dirac fermions in new regimes and for new device applications. Certain natural configurations of strain generate large nearly uniform pseudo-magnetic fields, which have opposite signs in the two valleys, and give rise to flat spin- and valley-degenerate pseudo Landau levels (PLLs). Here we consider the effect of the Coulomb interactions in strained graphene with uniform pseudo-magnetic field. We show that the spin/valley degeneracies of the PLLs get lifted by the interactions, giving rise to topological insulator-like states. In particular, when a nonzero PLL is quarter- or three-quarter filled, an anomalous quantum Hall state spontaneously breaking time-reversal symmetry emerges. At half-filled PLL, weak spin-orbital interaction stabilizes time-reversal-symmetric quantum spin-Hall state. These many-body states are characterized by the quantized conductance and persist to a high temperature scale set by the Coulomb interactions, which we estimate to be a few hundreds Kelvin at moderate strain values. At fractional fillings, fractional quantum Hall states breaking valley symmetry emerge. These results suggest a new route to realizing robust topological insulator states in mesoscopic graphene.Comment: 5 page

Quantized Transport in Graphene p-n Junctions in Magnetic Field

Recent experimental work on locally gated graphene layers resulting in p-n junctions have revealed quantum Hall effect in their transport behavior. We explain the observed conductance quantization which is fractional in the bipolar regime and integer in the unipolar regime in terms of quantum Hall edge modes propagating along and across the p-n interface. In the bipolar regime the electron and hole modes can mix at the p-n boundary, leading to current partition and quantized shot noise plateaus similar to those of conductance, while in the unipolar regime transport is noiseless. These quantum Hall phenomena reflect the massless Dirac character of charge carriers in graphene, with particle-hole interplay manifest in mode mixing and noise in the bipolar regime.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, available online at: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/114467

Ordering of magnetic impurities and tunable electronic properties of topological insulators

We study collective behavior of magnetic adatoms randomly distributed on the surface of a topological insulator. As a consequence of the spin-momentum locking on the surface, the RKKY-type interactions of two adatom spins depend on the direction of the vector connecting them, thus interactions of an ensemble of adatoms are frustrated. We show that at low temperatures the frustrated RKKY interactions give rise to two phases: an ordered ferromagnetic phase with spins pointing perpendicular to the surface, and a disordered spin-glass-like phase. The two phases are separated by a quantum phase transition driven by the magnetic exchange anisotropy. Ferromagnetic ordering occurs via a finite-temperature phase transition. The ordered phase breaks time-reversal symmetry spontaneously, driving the surface states into a gapped state, which exhibits an anomalous quantum Hall effect and provides a realization of the parity anomaly. We find that the magnetic ordering is suppressed by potential scattering. Our work indicates that controlled deposition of magnetic impurities provides a way to modify the electronic properties of topological insulators.Comment: 4+ pages, 2 figure

Nonlocal Charge Transport Mediated by Spin Diffusion in the Spin-Hall Effect Regime

A nonlocal electric response in the spin-Hall regime, resulting from spin diffusion mediating charge conduction, is predicted. The spin-mediated transport stands out due to its long-range character, and can give dominant contribution to nonlocal resistance. The characteristic range of nonlocality, set by the spin diffusion length, can be large enough to allow detection of this effect in materials such as GaAs despite its small magnitude. The detection is facilitated by a characteristic nonmonotonic dependence of transresistance on the external magnetic field, exhibiting sign changes and decay.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure