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Singular robust room-temperature spin response from topological Dirac fermions

Nature Materials volume 13, pages 580–585 (2014)Cite this article

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A Corrigendum to this article was published on 20 June 2014

This article has been updated

Abstract

Topological insulators are a class of solids in which the non-trivial inverted bulk band structure gives rise to metallic surface states1,2,3,4,5,6 that are robust against impurity scattering2,3,7,8,9. In three-dimensional (3D) topological insulators, however, the surface Dirac fermions intermix with the conducting bulk, thereby complicating access to the low-energy (Dirac point) charge transport or magnetic response. Here we use differential magnetometry to probe spin rotation in the 3D topological material family (Bi2Se3, Bi2Te3 and Sb2Te3). We report a paramagnetic singularity in the magnetic susceptibility at low magnetic fields that persists up to room temperature, and which we demonstrate to arise from the surfaces of the samples. The singularity is universal to the entire family, largely independent of the bulk carrier density, and consistent with the existence of electronic states near the spin-degenerate Dirac point of the 2D helical metal. The exceptional thermal stability of the signal points to an intrinsic surface cooling process, probably of thermoelectric origin10,11, and establishes a sustainable platform for the singular field-tunable Dirac spin response.

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Figure 1: Dirac point origin of the large singular spin susceptibility near zero magnetic field.
Figure 2: Universality of singular spin response near zero magnetic field.
Figure 3: Signatures of the surface origin of the cusp.
Figure 4: Surface cooling by the bulk.

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Change history

  • 22 May 2014

    In the version of this Letter originally published, in Fig. 3a, the values of n should have read '~1019 cm–3' and '~1017 cm–3'. This error has now been corrected in the online versions of the Letter.

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Acknowledgements

We greatly appreciate the insights of K. Park and thank G. Refael for his useful suggestions and comments. We gratefully acknowledge G. Kowach for his generous help and expert advice with the Bridgman crystal growth and A. Wołoś for selecting crystals with low carrier density. This work was supported by the NSF DMR-1122594 and DOD-W911NF-13-1-0159 (L.K-E.), and DMR-0955714 (V.O.).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, The City College of New York, CUNY, New York, New York 10031, USA

    Lukas Zhao, Haiming Deng, Inna Korzhovska, Zhiyi Chen & Lia Krusin-Elbaum

  2. The Graduate Center, CUNY, New York, New York 10016, USA

    Lukas Zhao, Inna Korzhovska, Zhiyi Chen, Vadim Oganesyan & Lia Krusin-Elbaum

  3. Laboratoire des Solides Irradiés, CNRS UMR 7642 and CEA-DSM-IRAMIS, Ecolé Polytechnique, F 91128 Palaiseau cedex, France

    Marcin Konczykowski

  4. Institute of Electronic Materials Technology, 01-919 Warsaw, Poland

    Andrzej Hruban

  5. Department of Engineering Science and Physics, College of Staten Island, CUNY, Staten Island, New York 10314, USA

    Vadim Oganesyan

Authors
  1. Lukas Zhao
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Contributions

Experiments were designed by L.Z. and L.K-E. L.Z. and H.D. carried out the growth of single crystals, M.K. and A.H. provided Bi2Te3 crystals with the lowest carrier densities, and I.K. and Z.C. performed structural and chemical characterization of all crystals. The a.c. susceptibility measurements were done by L.Z. and H.D., and data analysis was done by L.Z. and L.K-E. Dirac phenomenology and the mechanism of Peltier cooling were formulated jointly by V.O. and L.K-E. L.K-E. and V.O. wrote the manuscript with critical input from L.Z.

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Correspondence to Lia Krusin-Elbaum.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Zhao, L., Deng, H., Korzhovska, I. et al. Singular robust room-temperature spin response from topological Dirac fermions. Nature Mater 13, 580–585 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3962

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