Network model for periodically strained graphene

in Physical Review. B (2023), 107

The long-wavelength physics of monolayer graphene in the presence of periodic strain fields has a natural chiral scattering network description. When the strain field varies slowly compared to the ... [more ▼]

The long-wavelength physics of monolayer graphene in the presence of periodic strain fields has a natural chiral scattering network description. When the strain field varies slowly compared to the graphene lattice and the effective magnetic length of the induced valley pseudomagnetic field, the low-energy physics can be understood in terms of valley-polarized percolating domain-wall modes. Inspired by a recent experiment, we consider a strain field with threefold rotation and mirror sym- metries but without twofold rotation symmetry, resulting in a system with the connectivity of the oriented kagome network. Scattering processes in this network are captured by a symmetry- constrained phenomenological S matrix. We analyze the phase diagram of the kagome network, and show that the bulk physics of the strained graphene can be qualitatively captured by the network when we account for a percolation transition at charge neutrality. We also discuss the limitations of this approach to properly account for boundary physics. [less ▲]

Berry Curvature Spectroscopy from Bloch Oscillations

E-print/Working paper (2023)

We demonstrate that the Berry curvature of an isolated Bloch miniband in two-dimensional superlattices can be probed by the dressed linear optical response when a uniform static field is applied to the ... [more ▼]

We demonstrate that the Berry curvature of an isolated Bloch miniband in two-dimensional superlattices can be probed by the dressed linear optical response when a uniform static field is applied to the system. In particular, when the static field is sufficiently strong such that full Bloch oscillations occur before the crystal momentum relaxes to equilibrium, the optical response of the dressed system becomes resonant at the Bloch frequencies. The latter are in the THz regime when the superlattice periodicity is of the order of 10 nm. Using a band-projected semiclassical theory, we define a dressed optical conductivity and find that the height of the resonances in the dressed Hall conductivity are proportional to the Fourier components of the Berry curvature. We illustrate our results with a low-energy model on an effective honeycomb lattice. [less ▲]