Stacking-dependent topological magnons in bilayer CrI3

Physical Review Materials, vol. 7

Abstract

Motivated by the potential of atomically thin magnets towards achieving tunable high-frequency magnonics, we detail the spin-wave dispersion of bilayer ${\mathrm{CrI}}_{3}$. We demonstrate that the magnonic behavior of the bilayer strongly depends on its stacking configuration and the interlayer magnetic ordering, where a topological band gap opens in the dispersion caused by the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya and Kitaev interactions, classifying bilayer ${\mathrm{CrI}}_{3}$ as a topological magnon insulator. We further reveal that both the size and the topology of the band gap in a ${\mathrm{CrI}}_{3}$ bilayer with an antiferromagnetic interlayer ordering are tunable by an external magnetic field.

Authors 4

1. Maarten Soenen

   University of Antwerp

   Affiliation as printed

   Department of Physics & NANOlab Center of Excellence, University of Antwerp, Groenenborgerlaan 171, B-2020 Antwerp, Belgium

2. Cihan Bacaksız Aachen Computational Biotechnology

   RWTH Aachen University · University of Antwerp

   Affiliation as printed

   Bremen Center for Computational Material Science (BCCMS), Bremen D-28359, Germany

   Computational Biotechnology, RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, 52074 Aachen, Germany

   Department of Physics & NANOlab Center of Excellence, University of Antwerp, Groenenborgerlaan 171, B-2020 Antwerp, Belgium

3. Raí M. Menezes

   University of Antwerp

   Affiliation as printed

   Department of Physics & NANOlab Center of Excellence, University of Antwerp, Groenenborgerlaan 171, B-2020 Antwerp, Belgium

4. M. V. Miloševıć

   University of Antwerp · Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso

   Affiliation as printed

   Department of Physics & NANOlab Center of Excellence, University of Antwerp, Groenenborgerlaan 171, B-2020 Antwerp, Belgium

   Instituto de Física, Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso, Cuiabá, Mato Grosso 78060-900, Brazil