Transversal magnetoresistance in Weyl semimetals

TL;DR

This paper theoretically investigates the transverse magnetoresistance in Weyl and Dirac semimetals, revealing complex regimes and non-monotonous behavior depending on impurity types and magnetic field strength.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed theoretical analysis of magnetoresistance in Weyl semimetals considering two impurity models, highlighting novel non-analytic and scaling behaviors.

Findings

Magnetoresistance exhibits non-monotonous behavior with magnetic field.

At low fields, magnetoresistance vanishes as H^{1/3} for short-range impurities.

At high fields, magnetoresistance scales as 1/H for pointlike impurities and linearly for Coulomb impurities.

Abstract

We explore theoretically the magnetoresistvity of three-dimensional Weyl and Dirac semimetals in transversal magnetic fields within two alternative models of disorder: (i) short-range impurities and (ii) charged (Coulomb) impurities. Impurity scattering is treated using the self-consistent Born approximation. We find that an unusual broadening of Landau levels leads to a variety of regimes of the resistivity scaling in the temperature-magnetic field plane. In particular, the magnetoresitance is non-monotonous for the white-noise disorder model. For $H\to 0$ the magnetoresistance for short-range impurities vanishes in a non-analytic way as $H^{1/3}$. In the limits of strongest magnetic fields $H$, the magnetoresistivity vanishes as $1/H$ for pointlike impurities, while it is linear and positive in the model with Coulomb impurities.