Creation of helical Dirac fermions by interfacing two gapped systems of ordinary fermions

Abstract

Topological insulators are a unique class of materials characterized by a Dirac cone state of helical Dirac fermions in the middle of a bulk gap. When the thickness of a three-dimensional topological insulator is reduced, however, the interaction between opposing surface states opens a gap that removes the helical Dirac cone, converting the material back to a normal system of ordinary fermions. Here we demonstrate, using density function theory calculations and experiments, that it is possible to create helical Dirac fermion state by interfacing two gapped films-a single bilayer Bi grown on a single quintuple layer Bi 2 Se 3 or Bi 2 Te 3. These extrinsic helical Dirac fermions emerge in predominantly Bi bilayer states, which are created by a giant Rashba effect with a coupling constant of ∼4 eV·Å due to interfacial charge transfer. Our results suggest that this approach is a promising means to engineer topological insulator states on non-metallic surfaces. © 2013 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved.