Giant isotropic Nernst effect in an anisotropic Kondo semimetal

Abstract

The "failed Kondo insulator" CeNiSn has long been suspected to be a nodal metal, with a node in the hybridization matrix elements. Here we carry out a series of Nernst effect experiments to delineate whether the severely anisotropic magnetotransport coefficients do indeed derive from a nodal metal or can simply be explained by a highly anisotropic Fermi surface. Our experiments reveal that despite an almost 20-fold anisotropy in the Hall conductivity, the large Nernst signal is isotropic. Taken in conjunction with the magnetotransport anisotropy, these results provide strong support for an isotropic Fermi surface with a large anisotropy in quasiparticle mass derived from a nodal hybridization.

4.5 pages, 4 figures

References in corpus (3)

• Direct observation of the spin texture in strongly correlated SmB6 as evidence of the topological Kondo insulator
• β-YbAlB4: a critical nodal metal
• Heavy surface state in a possible topological Kondo insulator: Magneto-thermoelectric transport on the (011)-plane of SmB${}_6$

Cited by in corpus (6)

• Weyl-Kondo Semimetal in Heavy Fermion Systems
• Kondo Insulator to Semimetal Transformation Tuned by Spin-Orbit Coupling
• Thermoelectricity in correlated narrow-gap semiconductors
• Weyl-Kondo semimetals in nonsymmorphic systems
• Itinerant to relocalized transition of f electrons in the Kondo insulator CeRu4Sn6
• Inelastic neutron scattering and muon spin relaxation investigations of the deuterated Kondo lattices CeNiSnD${}_x$