Skin effect as a probe of transport regimes in Weyl semimetals

TL;DR

This paper investigates how chiral anomalies in Weyl semimetals influence electromagnetic skin effects, proposing a new nonlocal regime as a diagnostic tool for detecting these anomalies through optical measurements.

Contribution

It introduces a generalized kinetic theory that reveals a novel nonlocal skin effect regime caused by chiral anomalies, distinguishing it from conventional transport behaviors.

Findings

Identification of a new nonlocal skin effect regime due to chiral anomalies

Proposal of optical conductivity measurements as a diagnostic tool

Analysis of various transport regimes in Weyl semimetals

Abstract

We study the propagation of an oscillatory electromagnetic field inside a Weyl semimetal. In conventional conductors, the motion of the charge carriers in the skin layer near the surface can be diffusive, ballistic, or hydrodynamic. We show that the presence of chiral anomalies, intrinsic to the massless Weyl particles, leads to a hitherto neglected nonlocal regime that can separate the normal and viscous skin effects. We propose to use this novel regime as a diagnostic of the presence of chiral anomalies in optical conductivity measurements. These results are obtained from a generalized kinetic theory which includes various relaxation mechanisms, allowing us to investigate different transport regimes of Weyl semimetals.