Dynamical centrosymmetry breaking — A novel mechanism for second harmonic generation in graphene

David N. Carvalho, Andrea Marini, Fabio Biancalana

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

6 Citations (Scopus)
129 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

We discover an unusual phenomenon that occurs when a graphene monolayer is illuminated by a short and intense pulse at normal incidence. Due to the pulse-induced oscillations of the Dirac cones, a dynamical breaking of the layer’s centrosymmetry takes place, leading to the generation of second harmonic waves. We prove that this result can only be found by using the full Dirac equation and show that the widely used semiconductor Bloch equations fail to reproduce this and some other important physics of graphene. Our results open new windows in the understanding of nonlinear light-matter interactions in a wide variety of new 2D materials with a gapped or ungapped Dirac-like dispersion.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)24-32
Number of pages9
JournalAnnals of Physics
Volume378
Early online date14 Dec 2016
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Mar 2017

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