Dichroism as a probe for parity-breaking phases of spin-orbit coupled metals

TL;DR

This paper links optical and x-ray circular dichroism signals to parity-breaking order parameters in spin-orbit coupled metals, providing a new probe for detecting exotic phases like Weyl semimetals and pyrochlore superconductors.

Contribution

It establishes a formal connection between dichroic signals and order parameters in spin-orbit coupled metals, with detailed calculations for specific materials.

Findings

Dichroic signals correspond to order parameters in spin-orbit coupled metals.

The formalism applies to materials like Weyl semimetals and Cd2Re2O7.

Calculated x-ray absorption and dichroism at the O K edge for Cd2Re2O7.

Abstract

Recently, a general formalism was presented for gyrotropic, ferroelectric, and multipolar order in spin-orbit coupled metals induced by spin-spin interactions. Here, I point out that the resulting order parameters are equivalent to expectation values of operators that determine natural circular dichroic signals in optical and x-ray absorption. Some general properties of these operator equivalents and the resulting dichroisms are mentioned, and I list several material examples in this connection, including Weyl semimetals. The particular case of the tensor order in the pyrochlore superconductor Cd2Re2O7 is treated in more detail, including calculations of the x-ray absorption and circular dichroism at the O K edge.