Mechanism for subgap optical conductivity in honeycomb Kitaev materials

Abstract

Motivated by recent terahertz absorption measurements in $\alpha$-RuCl${}_3$, we develop a theory for the electromagnetic absorption of materials described by the Kitaev model on the honeycomb lattice. We derive a mechanism for the polarization operator at second order in the nearest-neighbor hopping Hamiltonian. Using the exact results of the Kitaev honeycomb model, we then calculate the polarization dynamical correlation function corresponding to electric dipole transitions, in addition to the spin dynamical correlation function corresponding to magnetic dipole transitions.

5 pages, 3 figures, published version with supplemental material

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Cited by in corpus (18)

• A Field Guide to Spin Liquids
• Field evolution of magnons in $\alpha$-RuCl${}_3$ by high-resolution polarized terahertz spectroscopy
• Signatures of low-energy fractionalized excitations in $\alpha$-RuCl${}_3$ from field-dependent microwave absorption
• Electrical Access to Ising Anyons in Kitaev Spin Liquids
• Field induced magnon excitation and in gap absorption of Kitaev candidate RuCl3
• Kitaev Quantum Spin Liquids
• THz excitations in α-RuCl3: Majorana fermions, rigid-plane shear and compression modes
• Theory of electronic magnetoelectric coupling in $d^5$ Mott insulators
• Magnetoelectric generation of a Majorana-Fermi surface in Kitaev's honeycomb model
• Sub-gap optical response across the structural phase transition in van der Waals layered α-RuCl${}_3$
• Electric-field control of magnetic anisotropies: applications to Kitaev spin liquids and topological spin textures
• Magnetic terahertz resonances above the Néel temperature in the frustrated kagome antiferromagnet averievite
• Local Raman Spectroscopy of Chiral Majorana Edge Modes in Kitaev Spin Liquids and Topological Superconductors
• Electric probe for the toric code phase in Kitaev materials through the hyperfine interaction
• Digital Quantum Simulation of the Kitaev Quantum Spin Liquid
• Evidence for distortion-induced local electric polarization in $\alpha$-RuCl${}_3$
• Electric polarization near vortices in the extended Kitaev model
• The Kekulé-Kitaev model: linear and non-linear responses and magnetic field effects