The recent discovered antiferromagnetic topological insulators in Mn-Bi-Te family with intrinsic magnetic ordering have rapidly drawn broad interest since its cleaved surface state is believed to be gapped, hosting the unprecedented axion states with half-integer quantum Hall effect. Here, however, we show unambiguously by using high-resolution angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy that a gapless Dirac cone at the (0001) surface of MnBi2Te4 exists between the bulk band gap. Such unexpected surface state remains unchanged across the bulk Né el temperature, and is even robust against severe surface degradation, indicating additional topological protection. Through symmetry analysis and ab-initio calculations we consider different types of surface reconstruction of the magnetic moments as possible origins giving rise to such linear dispersion. Our results reveal that the intrinsic magnetic topological insulator hosts a rich platform to realize various topological phases such
Magnetic topological insulators provide an important materials platform to explore emergent quantum phenomena such as the quantized anomalous Hall (QAH) effect, Majorana modes and the axion insulator state, etc. Recently, MnBi2Te4 was discovered to be the first material realization of a van der Waals (vdW) antiferromagnetic topological insulator (TI). In the two-dimensional (2D) limit, at a record high temperature of 4.5 K, MnBi2Te4 manifests the QAH effect in the forced ferromagnetic state above 12 T. To realize the QAH effect at lower fields, it is essential to search for magnetic TIs with lower saturation fields. By realizing a bulk vdW material MnBi4Te7 with alternating [MnBi2Te4]and [Bi2Te3] layers, we suggest that it is ferromagnetic in plane but antiferromagnetic along the c axis with a small out-of-plane saturation field of ~ 0.22 T at 2 K. Our angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy and first-principles calculations further demonstrate that MnBi4Te7 is a Z2 antiferromagnetic TI with two types of surface states associated with the [MnBi2Te4] or [Bi2Te3] termination, respectively. Therefore, MnBi4Te7 provides a new material platform to investigate emergent topological phenomena associated with the QAH effect at much lower magnetic fields in its 2D limit.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.