Physical Review Research (Jan 2024)

Promoting p-based Hall effects by p-d-f hybridization in Gd-based dichalcogenides

  • Mahmoud Zeer,
  • Dongwook Go,
  • Peter Schmitz,
  • Tom G. Saunderson,
  • Hao Wang,
  • Jamal Ghabboun,
  • Stefan Blügel,
  • Wulf Wulfhekel,
  • Yuriy Mokrousov

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.6.013095
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 6, no. 1
p. 013095

Abstract

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We conduct a first-principles study of Hall effects in rare-earth dichalcogenides, focusing on monolayers of the H-phase EuX_{2} and GdX_{2}, where X=S, Se, and Te. Our predictions reveal that all EuX_{2} and GdX_{2} systems exhibit high magnetic moments and wide band gaps. We observe that while in the case of EuX_{2} the p and f states hybridize directly below the Fermi energy, the absence of f and d states of Gd at the Fermi energy results in the p-like spin-polarized electronic structure of GdX_{2}, which mediates p-based magnetotransport. Notably, these systems display significant anomalous, spin, and orbital Hall conductivities. We find that in GdX_{2}, the strength of correlations controls the relative position of the p, d, and f states and their hybridization, which has a crucial impact on p-state polarization and the anomalous Hall effect, but not the spin and orbital Hall effects. Moreover, we find that the application of strain can significantly modify the electronic structure of the monolayers, resulting in quantized charge, spin, and orbital transport in GdTe_{2} via a strain-mediated orbital inversion mechanism taking place at the Fermi energy. Our findings suggest that rare-earth dichalcogenides hold promise as a platform for topological spintronics and orbitronics.