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Electronic properties of disordered Weyl semimetals at charge neutrality

Tobias Holder, Chia-Wei Huang, and Pavel M. Ostrovsky
Phys. Rev. B 96, 174205 – Published 13 November 2017

Abstract

Weyl semimetals have been intensely studied as a three-dimensional realization of a Dirac-like excitation spectrum where the conduction bands and valence bands touch at isolated Weyl points in momentum space. Like in graphene, this property entails various peculiar electronic properties. However, recent theoretical studies have suggested that resonant scattering from rare regions can give rise to a nonzero density of states even at charge neutrality. Here, we give a detailed account of this effect and demonstrate how the semimetallic nature is suppressed at the lowest scales. To this end, we develop a self-consistent T-matrix approach to investigate the density of states beyond the limit of weak disorder. Our results show a nonvanishing density of states at the Weyl point, which exhibits a nonanalytic dependence on the impurity density. This unusually strong effect of rare regions leads to a revised estimate for the conductivity close to the Weyl point and emphasizes possible deviations from semimetallic behavior in dirty Weyl semimetals at charge neutrality even with very low impurity concentration.

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  • Received 13 July 2017

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.96.174205

©2017 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Condensed Matter, Materials & Applied Physics

Authors & Affiliations

Tobias Holder1,2, Chia-Wei Huang1, and Pavel M. Ostrovsky1,3

  • 1Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research, Heisenbergstrasse 1, 70569, Stuttgart, Germany
  • 2Department of Condensed Matter Physics, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, 76100 Israel
  • 3L. D. Landau Institute for Theoretical Physics, 142432 Chernogolovka, Russia

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Issue

Vol. 96, Iss. 17 — 1 November 2017

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