Control over topological insulator photocurrents with light polarization

Abstract

Three-dimensional topological insulators represent a new quantum phase of matter with spin-polarized surface states that are protected from backscattering. The static electronic properties of these surface states have been comprehensively imaged by both photoemission and tunneling spectroscopies. Theorists have proposed that topological surface states can also exhibit novel electronic responses to light, such as topological quantum phase transitions and spin-polarized electrical currents. However, the effects of optically driving a topological insulator out of equilibrium have remained largely unexplored experimentally, and no photocurrents have been measured. Here we show that illuminating the topological insulator Bi2Se3 with circularly polarized light generates a photocurrent that originates from topological helical Dirac fermions, and that reversing the helicity of the light reverses the direction of the photocurrent. We also observe a photocurrent that is controlled by the linear polarization of light, and argue that it may also have a topological surface state origin. This approach may allow the probing of dynamic properties of topological insulators and lead to novel opto-spintronic devices.

Accepted in Nature Nanotechnology, November 2 2011

References in corpus (7)

• Discovery (theoretical prediction and experimental observation) of a large-gap topological-insulator class with spin-polarized single-Dirac-cone on the surface
• A topological Dirac insulator in a quantum spin Hall phase : Experimental observation of first strong topological insulator
• First direct observation of Spin-textures in Topological Insulators : Spin-resolved ARPES as a probe of topological quantum spin Hall effect and Berry's phase
• Topological Surface States Protected From Backscattering by Chiral Spin Texture
• Photoinduced transition between conventional and topological insulators in two-dimensional electronic systems
• Surface State Transport and Ambipolar Electric Field Effect in Bi2Se3 Nanodevices
• Semiclassical theory of the photogalvanic effect in non-centrosymmetric systems

Cited by in corpus (205)

• Topological Insulator Materials
• Emergent Phenomena Induced by Spin-Orbit Coupling at Surfaces and Interfaces
• Quantized circular photogalvanic effect in Weyl semimetals
• Topological nature of nonlinear optical effects in solids
• Direct visualization of current induced spin accumulation in topological insulators
• Direct optical detection of Weyl fermion chirality in a topological semimetal
• Electrically switchable Berry curvature dipole in the monolayer topological insulator WTe2
• Generation and Electric Control of Spin-Coupled Valley Current in WSe2
• Photocurrents in Weyl semimetals
• Light-induced emergent phenomena in 2D materials and topological materials
• Measurement of intrinsic Dirac fermion cooling on the surface of a topological insulator Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$ using time- and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy
• Ultrafast photocurrents at the surface of the three-dimensional topological insulator ${\mathrm{Bi}}_2{\mathrm{Se}}_3$
• Topological quantum materials from the viewpoint of chemistry
• Probing topological insulators surface states via plasma-wave Terahertz detection
• Photoelectron spin-flipping and texture manipulation in a topological insulator
• Topology and geometry under the nonlinear electromagnetic spotlight
• Light control with Weyl semimetals
• Bilinear magneto-electric resistance as a probe of three-dimensional spin texture in topological surface states
• Ultrafast helicity control of surface currents in topological insulators with near-unity fidelity
• Giant topological longitudinal circular photo-galvanic effect in the chiral multifold semimetal CoSi
• Direct Optical Coupling to an Unoccupied Dirac Surface State in the Topological Insulator Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$
• Topological Floquet Spectrum in Three Dimensions via a Two-Photon Resonance
• Chiral photocurrent in parity-violating magnet and enhanced response in topological antiferromagnet
• Consequences of Time-reversal-symmetry Breaking in the Light-Matter Interaction: Berry Curvature, Quantum Metric and Diabatic Motion
• Chiral terahertz wave emission from the Weyl semimetal TaAs
• Spatially dispersive circular photogalvanic effect in a Weyl semimetal
• Photocurrent as a multi-physics diagnostic of quantum materials
• Room temperature high frequency transport of Dirac fermions in epitaxially grown Sb_2Te_3 based topological insulators
• Spin-split bands cause the indirect band gap of (CH${}_3$NH${}_3$)PbI${}_3$: Experimental evidence from circular photogalvanic effect
• Radiation effects on the electronic structure of bilayer graphene
• One-dimensional helical transport in topological insulator nanowire interferometers
• Optical detection and manipulation of spontaneous gyrotropic electronic order in a transition-metal dichalcogenide semimetal
• Ultrafast carrier dynamics in thin-films of the topological insulator Bi2Se3
• Spintronic Sources of Ultrashort Terahertz Electromagnetic Pulses
• Examining electron-boson coupling using time-resolved spectroscopy
• Electrical injection and detection of spin-polarized currents in topological insulator Bi2Te2Se
• Layer-by-layer entangled spin-orbital texture of the topological surface state in Bi2Se3
• All-optical probe of three-dimensional topological insulators based on high-harmonic generation by circularly-polarized laser fields
• Enhancement of bulk photovoltaic effect in topological insulators
• Enhanced photogalvanic current in topological insulators via Fermi energy tuning
• Tracking ultrafast photocurrents in the Weyl semimetal TaAs using THz emission spectroscopy
• Two-Dimensional Photogalvanic Spin-Battery
• Ultrafast photodoping and effective Fermi-Dirac distribution of the Dirac particles in Bi2Se3
• Photoelectron spin-polarization-control in the topological insulator Bi2Se3
• Photon Drag Effect in (Bi${}_{1-x}$Sb${}_x$)${}_2$Te${}_3$ Three Dimensional Topological Insulators
• Spin Polarization of Photoelectrons from Topological Insulators
• Lightwave-controlled band engineering in quantum materials
• Strong-field physics in three-dimensional topological insulators
• Photoemission of Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$ with Circularly Polarized Light: Probe of Spin Polarization or Means for Spin Manipulation?
• Helicity dependent photocurrent in electrically gated (Bi,Sb)_2Te_3 thin films
• Photocurrent Response of Topological Insulator Surface States
• Superradiant phase transition in electronic systems and emergent topological phases
• Intrinsic Electron-Phonon Resistivity in Bi2Se3 in the Topological Regime
• Ultrafast Electron Dynamics in the Topological Insulator Bi2Se3 Studied by Time-Resolved Photoemission Spectroscopy
• Band resolved imaging of photocurrent in a topological insulator
• Shockley-Ramo theorem and long-range photocurrent response in gapless materials
• Shift charge and spin photocurrents in Dirac surface states of topological insulator
• Giant spin-polarized current in a Dirac fermion system at cyclotron resonance
• Unraveling photoinduced spin dynamics in topological insulator Bi2Se3
• Photovoltaic Chiral Magnetic Effect
• Infrared dielectric metamaterials from high refractive index chalcogenides
• Ultrafast spin polarization control of Dirac fermions in topological insulators
• Generation of Transient Photocurrents in the Topological Surface State of Sb${}_2$Te${}_3$ by Direct Optical Excitation with Mid-Infrared Pulses
• Momentum resolved spin dynamics of bulk and surface excited states in the topological insulator $\mathrm{B}{\mathrm{i}}_2\mathrm{S}{\mathrm{e}}_3$
• Unoccupied Topological States on Bismuth Chalcogenides
• Measurements of the quantum geometric tensor in solids
• Non-Gaussian correlations imprinted by local dephasing in fermionic wires
• Circular photon drag effect in bulk tellurium
• Colossal switchable photocurrents in topological Janus transition metal dichalcogenides
• Surface vibrational modes of the topological insulator Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$ observed by Raman spectroscopy
• Circular dichroism in angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy of topological insulators
• Fermi-Level Pinning, Charge Transfer, and Relaxation of Spin-Momentum Locking at Metal Contacts to Topological Insulators
• Light-Driven Nanoscale Vectorial Currents
• Conversion rules for Weyl points and nodal lines in topological media
• Sub-picosecond spin dynamics of excited states in the topological insulator Bi${}_2$Te${}_3$
• High-harmonic spectroscopy of light-driven nonlinear anisotropic anomalous Hall effect in a Weyl semimetal
• Spin Hall photoconductance in a 3D topological insulator at room temperature
• Tunneling Planar Hall Effect in Topological Insulators: Spin-Valves and Amplifiers
• An Anomalous Circular Photogalvanic Effect in the Weyl Semimetal TaAs
• Dissipation and geometry in nonlinear quantum transports of multiband electronic systems
• Laser-induced effects on the electronic features of graphene nanoribbons
• Infrared/Terahertz Spectra of the Photogalvanic Effect in (Bi,Sb)Te based Three Dimensional Topological Insulators
• Excited states of two-dimensional solitons supported by the spin-orbit coupling and field-induced dipole-dipole repulsion
• Photo-Nernst current in graphene
• Ultrafast polarization control of zero-bias photocurrent and terahertz emission in hybrid organic perovskites
• Oscillatory surface dichroism of an insulating topological insulator Bi2Te2Se
• Topological Crystalline Insulator Nanostructures
• Anisotropic effect of warping on the lifetime broadening of topological surface states in angle-resolved photoemission from Bi${}_2$Te${}_3$
• Self-powered Filterless On-chip Full-Stokes Polarimeter
• Towards colloidal spintronics through Rashba spin-orbit interaction in lead sulphide nanosheets
• Coherent control of injection currents in high-quality films of Bi2Se3
• Unconventional transformation of spin Dirac phase across a topological quantum phase transition
• Ultrafast Energy- and Momentum-resolved Surface Dirac Photocurrents in the Topological Insulator Sb${}_2$Te${}_3$
• Terahertz Photogalvanic Spectroscopy of Three Dimensional Topological Insulators
• Photon dressed electronic states in topological insulators: Tunneling and conductance
• Tunable Circular Photogalvanic and Photovoltaic Effect in 2D Tellurium with Different Chirality
• Growth and band alignment of Bi2Se3 topological insulator on H-terminated Si(111) van der Waals surface
• Low-frequency phase diagram of irradiated graphene and periodically driven spin-1/2 $XY$ chain
• Highly efficient spin-to-charge current conversion at room temperature in strained HgTe surface states
• Engineering topological surface-states: HgS, HgSe and HgTe
• Revealing the ultrafast light-to-matter energy conversion before heat diffusion in a layered Dirac semimetal
• Nonvanishing sub-gap photocurrent as a probe of lifetime effects
• Photogalvanic effect in HgTe/CdTe topological insulator due to edge-bulk optical transitions
• Coherent control of optical injection of spin and currents in topological insulators
• High Discrimination Ratio, Broadband Circularly Polarized Light Photodetector Using Dielectric Achiral Nanostructures
• Terahertz electric field driven electric currents and ratchet effects in graphene
• Gate-Variable Mid-Infrared Optical Transitions in a $(B{i}_{1-x}S{b}_x{)}_{2}T{e}_3$ Topological Insulator
• Temperature-induced inversion of the spin-photogalvanic effect in WTe${}_2$ and MoTe${}_2$
• Modification and Control of Topological Insulator Surface States Using Surface Disorder
• High-frequency nonlinear transport and photogalvanic effects in two-dimensional topological insulators
• Spin-momentum locked interaction between guided photons and surface electrons in topological insulators
• Landau Level Spectroscopy of Dirac Electrons in a Polar Semiconductor with Giant Rashba Spin Splitting
• Helicity dependent photovoltaic effect in Bi2Se3 under normal incident light
• Nonlinear optical response of doped mono- and bilayer graphene: length gauge tight-binding model
• Optical manipulation of Rashba-split 2-Dimensional Electron Gas
• Local photocurrent generation in thin films of the topological insulator Bi2Se3
• Anisotropic circular photogalvanic effect in colloidal tin sulfide nanosheets
• Photocurrents in Bi2Se3: bulk versus surface, and injection versus shift currents
• Tunable photo-galvanic effect on topological insulator surfaces via proximity interactions
• Topology and symmetry of circular photogalvanic effect in the chiral multifold semimetals: a review
• Second harmonic spectroscopy to optically detect valley polarization in 2D materials
• Spherical topological-insulator nanoparticles: Quantum size effects and optical transitions
• Theory of topological exciton insulators and condensates in flat Chern bands
• Circular photogalvanic effect in Cu/Bi bilayers
• Coherent ultrafast spin-dynamics probed in three dimensional topological insulators
• Highly superlinear photogalvanic effects in (Bi${}_{0.3}$Sb${}_{0.7}$)${}_2$(Te${}_{0.1}$Se${}_{0.9}$)${}_3$: Probing 3D topological insulator surface states at room temperature
• Synchrotron radiation induced magnetization in magnetically-doped and pristine topological insulators
• Cavity Induced Topology in Graphene
• Photocurrent generation in solids via linearly polarized laser
• Optically tunable spin transport on the surface of a topological insulator
• Chemical Potential Fluctuations in Topological Insulator (Bi${}_{0.5}$Sb${}_{0.5}$)${}_2$Te${}_3$ Films Visualized by Photocurrent Spectroscopy
• Strong Photothermoelectric Response and Contact Reactivity of the Dirac Semimetal ZrTe5
• Charge and spin photocurrents in the Rashba model
• Impact of ultrafast transport on the high-energy states of a photoexcited topological insulator
• Observation of terahertz second harmonic generation from Dirac surface states in the topological insulator Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$
• Electrically controllable spin filtering based on superconducting helical states
• Global and Local Topological Quantized Responses from Geometry, Light and Time
• Topological transport in Dirac electronic systems: A concise review
• Optical bulk-boundary dichotomy in a quantum spin Hall insulator
• Photon-drag photovoltaic effects and quantum geometric nature
• Scaling laws for nonlinear electromagnetic responses of Dirac fermions
• A cascading nonlinear magneto-optical effect in topological insulators
• Ultrafast Momentum-resolved Hot Electron Dynamics in the Two-dimensional Topological Insulator Bismuthene
• Dynamics and Control of Edge States in Laser-driven Graphene Nanoribbons
• Photo-Seebeck effect in single-crystalline bismuth telluride topological insulator
• Electrical detection of spin-polarized current in topological insulator Bi1.5Sb0.5Te1.7Se1.3
• Raman Photogalvanic Effect: photocurrent at inelastic light scattering
• Switchable quantized conductance in topological insulators revealed by the Shockley-Ramo theorem
• Current amplification and relaxation in Dirac systems
• Photo-induced change of refractive index and transparency in Bi2Te3 films
• Ultrafast dynamics of photocurrents in surface states of 3D topological insulators
• Ultrafast shift and rectification photocurrents in GaAs quantum wells: Excitation intensity dependence and the importance of bandmixing
• Fast Dynamics of Vortices in Superconductors
• Exchange-Driven Intermixing of Bulk and Topological Surface State by Chiral Excitons in Bi2Se3
• Excitation wavelength-dependent ultrafast THz emission from surface and bulk of three-dimensional topological insulators
• Discovery of highly spin-polarized conducting surface states in the strong spin-orbit coupling semiconductor Sb${}_2$Se${}_3$
• Photocurrent measurements in topological insulator ${\text{Bi}}_2{\text{Se}}_3$ nanowires
• Electronic correlation determining correlated plasmons in Sb-doped Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$
• Terahertz radiation by subpicosecond spin-polarized photocurrent originating from Dirac electrons in a Rashba-type polar semiconductor
• Versatile Large-Area Custom-Feature van der Waals Epitaxy of Topological Insulators
• THz Photodetector using sideband-modulated transport through surface states of a 3D Topological Insulator
• Barrier height inhomogeneity and origin of 1/f-noise in topological insulator-based photo-detector
• Absence of quantization in the circular photogalvanic effect in disordered chiral Weyl semimetals
• The impact of metallic contacts on spin-polarized photocurrents in topological insulator ${\text{Bi}}_2{\text{Se}}_3$ nanowires
• Direct imprinting of arbitrary spin textures using programmable structured light in a semiconductor two-dimensional electron gas
• Pseudo-Spin, Real-Spin and Spin Polarization of Photo-emitted Electrons
• Plasmons in single- and double-component helical liquids: Application to two-dimensional topological insulators
• Observation of optical absorption correlated with surface state of topological insulator
• Interface enhanced helicity dependent photocurrent in metal/semimetal bilayers
• Inverse Spin Hall Effect Induced by Asymmetric Illumination of Light on Topological Insulator Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$
• Instantaneous Photon Drag Currents in Topological Insulators
• Broken symmetries associated with a Kagome chiral charge order
• Realizing a topological diode effect on the surface of a topological Kondo insulator
• Giant inverse Faraday effect in Dirac semimetals
• Nanosecond dynamics in intrinsic topological insulator ${\text{Bi}}_{2-x}{\text{Sb}}_x{\text{Se}}_3$ revealed by time-resolved optical reflectivity
• Reversible Engineering of Topological Insulator Surface State Conductivity through Optical Excitation
• Electromagnon on the Surface of Magnetic Topological Insulator
• Spectroscopy and topological properties of a Haldane light system
• Topological Insulator Metamaterial with Giant Circular Photogalvanic Effect
• Tunable chirality and circular dichroism of a topological insulator with $C_{2v}$ symmetry as a function of Rashba and Dresselhaus parameters
• Band Structure and Polarization Effects in Photothermoelectric Spectroscopy of a Bi2Se3 Device
• Electric Field Control of Spin Orbit Coupling and Circular Photogalvanic Effect in a True Ferrielectric Crystal
• Photon Energy Dependence of Kerr Rotation in Chalcogenide Superlattices
• One-dimensional scattering of fermions in double Dirac delta potentials
• Visualization of optical polarization transfer to photoelectron spin vector emitted from the spin-orbit coupled surface state
• Ultrafast electron dynamics in a topological surface state observed in two-dimensional momentum space
• Nonlinear Optical Spectroscopy of Nodal-Line Semimetals
• Theory for entanglement of electrons dressed with circularly polarized light in Graphene and three-dimensional topological insulators
• Anisotropic angle-dependent Andreev reflection at the ferromagnet/superconductor junction on the surface of topological insulators
• Observation of spin Nernst photocurrents in topological insulators
• Nonequilibrium topological spin textures in momentum space
• Ultrafast electron dynamics at the Dirac node of the topological insulator Sb${}_2$Te${}_3$
• Surface Circular Photogalvanic Effect in Tl-Pb Monolayer Alloys on Si(111) with Giant Rashba Splitting
• Transport theory for electrical detection of the spin texture and spin-momentum locking of topological surface states
• Engineering Floquet moiré patterns for scalable photocurrents
• Optical-vortex-pulse induced nonequilibrium spin textures in spin-orbit coupled electrons
• Quantum geometry in low-energy linear and nonlinear optical responses of magnetic Rashba semiconductor (Ge,Mn)Te
• Generation and manipulation of chiral terahertz waves emitted from the three-dimensional topological insulator Bi2Te3
• Distinguishing between dynamical and static Rashba effects in hybrid perovskite nanocrystals using transient absorption spectroscopy
• Persistent current-carrying state of charge quasuparticles in $np$-ribbon featuring single Dirac cone
• Terahertz electro-optic effect in Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$ crystals
• Wavefunction-Free Approach for Predicting Nonlinear Responses in Weyl Semimetals
• Enhanced detection of circularly polarized photons with topological materials
• Controlling helicity-dependent photocurrent in polycrystalline Sb${}_2$Te${}_2$Se topological insulator thin films at ambient temperature through wave-vector of and photothermal gradient due to polarized light
• All-Optical Generation of Antiferromagnetic Magnon Currents via the Magnon Circular Photogalvanic Effect