# Flat bands and perfect metal in trilayer moir\'e graphene

## TL;DR

This paper explores the electronic properties of twisted trilayer graphene, revealing flat bands and a perfect metallic state due to the unique coupling of Dirac cones and emergent symmetries.

## Contribution

It extends the low-energy theory of moiré graphene to trilayers, demonstrating the emergence of flat bands and a perfect metal state at specific twist angles.

## Key findings

- Flat bands appear at certain rotation angles in trilayer moiré graphene.
- The system is a perfect metal, remaining gapless at all energies.
- The gapless state is protected by an emergent particle-hole symmetry.

## Abstract

We investigate the electronic structure of a twisted multilayer graphene system forming a moir\'e pattern. We consider small twist angles separating the graphene sheets and develop a low-energy theory to describe the coupling of Dirac Bloch states close to the K point in each individual plane. Extending beyond the bilayer case, we show that, when the ratio of the consecutive twist angles is rational, a periodicity emerges in quasimomentum space with moir\'e Bloch bands even when the system does not exhibit a crystalline lattice structure in real space. For a trilayer geometry, we find flat bands in the spectrum at certain rotation angles. Performing a symmetry analysis of the band model for the trilayer, we prove that the system is a perfect metal in the sense that it is gapless at all energies. This striking result originates from the three Dirac cones which can only gap in pairs and produce bands with an infinite connectivity. The full gapless property is protected by an emergent particle-hole symmetry valid at sufficiently small angles.