Field-induced resistivity plateau and unsaturated negative magnetoresistance in topological semimetal TaSb2

TL;DR

This study reports that the topological semimetal TaSb2 exhibits both a resistivity plateau at low temperatures and unsaturated negative magnetoresistance, revealing new insights into topological metallic states without time reversal symmetry.

Contribution

It demonstrates that TaSb2 uniquely combines phenomena typically seen separately in different topological materials, broadening understanding of topological states and their transport signatures.

Findings

TaSb2 exhibits a resistivity plateau below 13 K.

Negative magnetoresistance does not saturate up to 9 T.

TaSb2 shows quantum oscillations with non-trivial Berry phases.

Abstract

Several prominent transport properties have been identified as key signatures of topologicalmaterials. One is the resistivity plateau at low temperatures as observed in several topological insulators (TIs), another is the negative magnetoresistance (MR) when the applied magnetic field is parallel to the current direction as observed in several topological semimetals (TSMs) including Dirac semimetals (DSMs) and Weyl semimetals (WSMs). Usually, these two exotic phenomena emerge in distinct materials with or without time reversal symmetry (TRS), respectively. Here we report the discovery of a new member in TSMs, TaSb2, which clearly exhibits both of these phenomena in a single material. This compound crystallizes in a base-centered monoclinic, centrosymmetric structure, and is metallic with a low carrier density in the zero field. While applying magnetic field it exhibits insulating behavior before appearance of a resistivity plateau below Tc =13 K. In the plateau regime, the ultrahigh carrier mobility and extreme magnetoresistance (XMR) for the field perpendicular to the current are observed as in DSMs and WSMs, in addition to a quantum oscillation behavior with non-trivial Berry phases. In contrast to the most known DSMs and WSMs, the negative MR in TaSb2 does not saturate up to 9 T, which, together with the almost linear Hall resistivity, manifests itself an electron-hole non-compensated TMS. These findings indicate that the resistivity plateau could be a generic feature of topology-protected metallic states even in the absence of TRS and compatible with the negative MR depending on the field direction. Our experiment extends a materials basis represented by TaSb2 as a new platform for future theoretical investigations and device applications of topological materials.