Massless Dirac fermions in two dimensions: Confinement in nonuniform magnetic fields

C. A. Downing and M. E. Portnoi
Phys. Rev. B 94, 165407 – Published 10 October 2016

Abstract

We show how it is possible to trap two-dimensional massless Dirac fermions in spatially inhomogeneous magnetic fields, as long as the formed magnetic quantum dot (or ring) is of a slowly decaying nature. It is found that a modulation of the depth of the magnetic quantum dot leads to successive confinement-deconfinement transitions of vortexlike states with a certain angular momentum, until a regime is reached where only states with one sign of angular momentum are supported. We illustrate these characteristics with both exact solutions and a hitherto unknown quasi-exactly solvable model utilizing confluent Heun functions.

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  • Received 18 July 2016
  • Revised 2 September 2016

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.94.165407

©2016 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

  1. Physical Systems
Condensed Matter, Materials & Applied Physics

Authors & Affiliations

C. A. Downing1,* and M. E. Portnoi2,3,†

  • 1Institut de Physique et Chimie des Matériaux de Strasbourg, Université de Strasbourg, CNRS UMR 7504, F-67034 Strasbourg, France
  • 2School of Physics, University of Exeter, Stocker Road, Exeter EX4 4QL, United Kingdom
  • 3International Institute of Physics, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, 59012-970 Natal, Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil

  • *downing@ipcms.unistra.fr
  • m.e.portnoi@exeter.ac.uk

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Vol. 94, Iss. 16 — 15 October 2016

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