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  • Letter
  • Open Access

Chirality flip of Weyl nodes and its manifestation in strained MoTe2

Viktor Könye1, Adrien Bouhon2, Ion Cosma Fulga1, Robert-Jan Slager3, Jeroen van den Brink1,4, and Jorge I. Facio1

  • 1Institute for Theoretical Solid State Physics, IFW Dresden and Würzburg-Dresden Cluster of Excellence ct.qmat, Helmholtzstr. 20, 01069 Dresden, Germany
  • 2Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics (NORDITA), Hannes Alfvéns väg 12, 106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
  • 3TCM Group, Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, J. J. Thomson Avenue, Cambridge CB3 0HE, United Kingdom
  • 4Institute for Theoretical Physics, TU Dresden, 01069 Dresden, Germany

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Phys. Rev. Research 3, L042017 – Published 5 November, 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.3.L042017

Abstract

Due to their topological charge, or chirality, the Weyl cones present in topological semimetals are considered robust against arbitrary perturbations. One well-understood exception to this robustness is the pairwise creation or annihilation of Weyl cones, which involves the overlap in energy and momentum of two oppositely charged nodes. Here we show that the topological charge can in fact change sign, in a process that involves the merging of not two, but three Weyl nodes. This is facilitated by the presence of rotation and time-reversal symmetries, which constrain the relative positions of Weyl cones in momentum space. We analyze the chirality flip process, showing that transport properties distinguish it from the conventional, double Weyl merging. Moreover, we predict that the chirality flip occurs in MoTe2, where experimentally accessible strain leads to the merging of three Weyl cones close to the Fermi level. Our work sets the stage to further investigate and observe such chirality flipping processes in different topological materials.

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Phys. Rev. Research 3, L042017– Published 5 November, 2021
  • Received 9 July 2021
  • Accepted 15 October 2021
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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