Honeycomb Charge Ordering in IrTe${}_2$

Abstract

We report on the observation of a unique honeycomb charge ordering of the cleaved IrTe${}_2$ surface by high-resolution scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) and spectroscopy (STS). IrTe${}_2$ was recently established to exhibit intriguing stripe charge orderings. Here, we show that the stripe charge order coexists with a metastable honeycomb phase formed locally. The atomic and electronic structures of the honeycomb phase are consistent with the stripe phase indicating unambiguously its charge order nature. A simple model of the honeycomb structure is suggested based on the overlap of three degenerate stripe orders, which is analogous to the 3$q$ state description of a skyrmion. We suggest that the honeycomb charge order can be a route to an exotic Dirac electron system.

Another version was updated to arxiv "Nanoscale Superconducting Honeycomb Charge Order in IrTe2" arXiv:1605.06962