Photogalvanic Effect in Weyl Semimetals from First Principles

TL;DR

This paper presents the first first-principles calculations of the photogalvanic effect in Weyl semimetals, revealing colossal photocurrents driven by three-band transitions involving Weyl and trivial bands, aligning well with experimental data.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive first-principles approach to understanding nonlinear optical effects in Weyl semimetals, emphasizing the importance of full band structure analysis.

Findings

Colossal photocurrents caused by Weyl points

Three-band transitions dominate the photocurrent

Calculated photoconductivities match experiments

Abstract

Using first-principles calculations, we investigate the photogalvanic effect in the Weyl semimetal material TaAs. We find colossal photocurrents caused by the Weyl points in the band structuure in a wide range of laser frequency. Our calculations reveal that the photocurrent is predominantly contributed by the three-band transition from the occupied Weyl band to the empty Weyl band via an intermediate band away from the Weyl cone, for excitations both by linearly and circularly polarized lights. Therefore, it is significant to sum over all three-band transitions by considering a full set of Bloch bands (both Weyl bands and trivial bands) in the first-principles band structure while it does not suffice to only consider the two-band direct transition within a Weyl cone. Calculated photoconductivities are well consistent with recent experiment measurements. Our work provides the first first-principles calculation on nonlinear optical phenomena of Weyl semimetals and serves as a deep understanding of the photogalvanic effects in complexed materials.