Weyl fermions with arbitrary monopole in magnetic fields: Landau levels, longitudinal magnetotransport, and density-wave ordering

TL;DR

This paper explores how strong magnetic fields affect Weyl semimetals with different monopole charges, revealing unique Landau level structures, magnetotransport behaviors, and density-wave instabilities that depend on the monopole charge and field orientation.

Contribution

It provides a theoretical analysis of Landau levels, magnetotransport, and density-wave instabilities in Weyl semimetals with arbitrary monopole charge under strong magnetic fields.

Findings

Longitudinal magnetoconductivity scales linearly with magnetic field for all monopole charges.

Tilted magnetic fields cause a crossover from linear to nonlinear B-dependence in magnetoconductivity.

Density-wave orderings can form due to Landau level effects, leading to negative magnetoconductivity at low temperatures or high fields.

Abstract

We theoretically address the effects of strong magnetic fields in three-dimensional Weyl semimetals (WSMs) built out of Weyl nodes with a monopole charge $n$. For $n=1$, $2$, and $3$ we realize single, double, and triple WSM, respectively, and the monopole charge $n$ determines the integer topological invariant of the WSM. Within the linearized continuum description, the quasiparticle spectrum is then composed of Landau levels (LLs), containing exactly $n$ number of chiral zeroth Landau levels (ZLLs), irrespective of the orientation of the magnetic field. In the presence of strong backscattering, for example, (due to quenched disorder associated with random impurities), these systems generically give rise to longitudinal magnetotransport. Restricting ourselves to the quantum limit (and assuming only the subspace of the ZLLs to be partially filled) and mainly accounting for Gaussian impurities, we show that the longitudinal magnetoconductivity (LMC) in all members of the Weyl family displays a positive linear-$B$ scaling, when the field is applied along the axis that separates the Weyl nodes. But, in double and triple WSM, LMC displays a smooth crossover to a nonlinear $B$-dependence as the field is tilted away from such a high-symmetry direction. In addition, due to the enhanced density of states, the LL quantization can trigger instabilities toward the formation of translational symmetry breaking density-wave orderings for sufficiently weak interaction (BCS instability), which gaps out the ZLLs. Concomitantly as the temperature (magnetic field) is gradually decreased (increased) the LMC becomes negative. Thus WSMs with arbitrary monopole charge ($n$) can host an intriguing interplay of LL quantization, longitudinal magnetotransport (a possible manifestation of one-dimensional chiral or axial anomaly), and density-wave ordering, when placed in a strong magnetic field.