Shift charge and spin photocurrents in Dirac surface states of topological insulator

Abstract

The generation of photocurrent in condensed matter is of main interest for photovoltaic and optoelectronic applications. Shift current, a nonlinear photoresponse, has attracted recent intensive attention as a dominant player of bulk photovoltaic effect in ferroelectric materials. In three dimensional topological insulators ${\text{Bi}}_2{\text{X}}_3$ (X: Te, Se), we find that Dirac surface states with a hexagonal warping term carry shift current by linearly polarized light. In addition, shift spin-current is introduced with the time-reversal symmetry breaking perturbation. The estimate for the magnitudes of the shift charge- and spin-currents are 0.13$I_0$ and 0.21$I_0$(nA/m) with the intensity of light $I_0$ measured in $(\text{W}/{\text{m}}^2)$, respectively, which can offer a useful method to generate these currents efficiently.

12 pages including supplementary information, 2 figures

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Cited by in corpus (6)

• Nonlinear spin current generation in noncentrosymmetric spin-orbit coupled systems
• Resonant photovoltaic effect in doped magnetic semiconductors
• A comprehensive theory of second-order spin photocurrents
• Shift current from electromagnon excitations in multiferroics
• Intrinsic Contribution to Non-linear Thermoelectric Effect
• Terahertz spin ratchet effect in magnetic metamaterials