Abstract
Two-dimensional Floquet systems consisting of irradiated valley-polarized metal are investigated. For the corresponding static systems, we consider two graphene models of valley-polarized metal with either a staggered sublattice or uniform intrinsic spin-orbital coupling, whose Dirac point energies are different from the intrinsic Fermi level. If the frequency of irradiation is appropriately designed, the largest dynamical gap (first-order dynamical gap) opens around the intrinsic Fermi level. In the presence of the irradiation, two types of edge states appear at the zigzag edge of the semi-infinite sheet with energy within the first-order dynamical gap: the Floquet edge states and the strongly localized edge states. In narrow zigzag nanoribbons, the Floquet edge states are gapped out by the finite-size effect and the strongly localized edge states remain gapless. As a result, the conducting channels of the nanoribbons consist of the strongly localized edge states. Under the first and second model, the strongly localized edge states carry one-way spin-polarized and one-way charge current around the intrinsic Fermi level, respectively. Thus, the narrow zigzag nanoribbons of the first and second model have asymmetric spin and charge transmission rates, respectively. Quantum-transport calculations predict sizable pumped currents of charge and spin, which could be controlled by the Fermi level.
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