• 文献标题:   Spin and the Honeycomb Lattice: Lessons from Graphene
  • 文献类型:   Article
  • 作  者:   MECKLENBURG M, REGAN BC
  • 作者关键词:  
  • 出版物名称:   PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS
  • ISSN:   0031-9007 EI 1079-7114
  • 通讯作者地址:   Univ Calif Los Angeles
  • 被引频次:   65
  • DOI:   10.1103/PhysRevLett.106.116803
  • 出版年:   2011

▎ 摘  要

A model of electrons hopping from atom to atom in graphene's honeycomb lattice gives low-energy electronic excitations that obey a relation formally identical to a 2 + 1 dimensional Dirac equation. Graphene's spin equivalent, "pseudospin," arises from the degeneracy introduced by the honeycomb lattice's two inequivalent atomic sites per unit cell. Previously it has been thought that the usual electron spin and the pseudospin indexing the graphene sublattice state are merely analogues. Here we show that the pseudospin is also a real angular momentum. This identification explains the suppression of electron backscattering in carbon nanotubes and the angular dependence of light absorption by graphene. Furthermore, it demonstrates that half-integer spin like that carried by the quarks and leptons can derive from hidden substructure, not of the particles themselves, but rather of the space in which these particles live.