Randomly twisted bilayer graphene: Cascade transitions

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Authors: B. Horovitz, Pierre Le Doussal
Cited by: 0
References: 33

Abstract

Twisted bilayer graphene (TBG) is known to have disorder in its twist angle. We show that in terms of a Dirac equation with a random gauge potential ${\bf A}({\bf r})$ this disorder becomes huge when the average twist angle is near the magic angle where the Dirac velocity vanishes. The density of states (DOS) then diverges at the Dirac point as $ρ(E)\sim E^{(2/z)-1}$ with $z\gg 1$ and we deduce that all electrons occupy energies very near $E=0$. We prove a sum rule on the disorder averaged eigenfunctions from which we deduce that each added electron contributes equal intraband Coulomb interaction energy. The various bands in TBG are related by either ${\bf A}({\bf r})\rightarrow {\bf A}({-\bf r})$ or ${\bf A}({\bf r})\rightarrow -{\bf A}({\bf r})$ which affects the interband interaction energy. We find, within Hartree-Fock, jumps in the chemical potential at each integer filling, accounting for the cascade transitions.

Fields of Study & Subjects

Graphene research and applications Topological Materials and Phenomena Quantum and electron transport phenomena

Publication details

Journal / source
Physical review. B./Physical review. B
Volume
113
Issue
23
Publication date
19 May 2026
Language
EN