Evolution and dimensional crossover from the bulk subbands in ABC-stacked graphene to a three-dimensional Dirac cone structure in rhombohedral graphite

TL;DR

This paper investigates the evolution of bulk subbands in ABC-stacked graphene as the number of layers increases, revealing a transition to a 3D Dirac cone structure in rhombohedral graphite, with implications for topological properties.

Contribution

It provides the first derivation of bulk subbands for arbitrary N in ABC-stacked graphene and demonstrates the dimensional crossover to a 3D Dirac cone structure.

Findings

Bulk subbands are obtained for arbitrary N.

Bulk subbands evolve towards zero energy with increasing N.

In the infinite limit, bulk subbands form a Dirac cone with nodal lines.

Abstract

The band structure of ABC-stacked N-layer graphene comprises topologically corresponding flat surface and gapped bulk subbands, as a consequence of the unique stacking configuration. In this paper, the bulk subbands are for the first times ever obtained for arbitrary N. A non-perturbative effective Hamiltonian closed in the bulk subspace is derived and used. The gapped bulk subbands are shown to evolve towards the zero energy with increasing N and in the infinite limit, they touch linearly along a circle. This outcome is a manifestation of the dimensional crossover to a three-dimensional Dirac cone structure known to exist in the bulk of rhombohedral graphite. The Dirac points, forming continuous nodal lines in a spiraling fashion, are projected onto the circle, within which the surface subbands are confined and flatten.