Observation of Magnetoplasmons in Bi2Se3 Topological Insulator

Abstract

Both the collective (plasmon) and the single particle (Drude) excitations of an electron gas can be controlled and modified by an external magnetic field B. At finite B, plasmon gives rise to a magnetoplasmon mode and the Drude term to a cyclotron resonance. These magnetic effects are expected to be extremely strong for Dirac electrons with a linear energy-momentum dispersion, like those present in graphene and topological insulators (TIs). Here, we investigate both the plasmon and the Drude response versus B in Bi2Se3 topological insulator. At low B, the cyclotron resonance is still well separated in energy from the magnetoplasmon mode; meanwhile, both excitations asymptotically converge at the same energy for increasing B, consistently with a dynamical mass for Dirac carriers of mD* = 0.18 ± 0.01 me. In TIs, one then achieves an excellent magnetic control of plasmonic excitations and this could open the way toward plasmon controlled terahertz magneto-optics.