Counterpropagating Fractional Hall States in Mirror-Symmetric Dirac Semimetals.

Abstract

The Landau bands of mirror symmetric 2D Dirac semimetals (e.g., odd layers of ABA graphene) can be identified by their parity with respect to mirror symmetry. This symmetry facilitates a new class of counterpropagating Hall states. We predict the presence of a Laughlin-like correlated liquid state, at the charge neutrality point, with opposite but equal electron and hole filling factors |ν_{±}|=1/m (m odd). This state exhibits fractionally charged quasiparticle-hole pair excitations and counterpropagating edge states with opposite parity. Using a bosonized one-dimensional edge state theory, we show that the fractionally quantized two-terminal longitudinal conductance, σ_{xx}=2e^{2}/(mh), is robust to short-ranged intermode interactions.