The mechanical strain induced anomalous de Haas–van Alphen effect on graphene

Abstract

When a uniform magnetic field is applied to graphene, the magnetisation and magnetic susceptibility both exhibit oscillations periodic in 1/B, i.e., de Haas–van Alphen (dHvA) effect. Such magnetic dHvA oscillations reflect the fundamental reorganisation of carrier states into Landau levels as a canonical response of graphene to the applied magnetic field. We predict here that, remarkably, in graphene, dHvA oscillations can occur in the complete absence of magnetic field. These zero-field dHvA oscillations are driven by mechanical strain which, in the space of the low-energy Dirac fermions, acts as a gauge field, i.e. a uniform strain pseudomagnetic field with magnitudes up to hundreds of tesla, far beyond the practical magnetic field, thereby providing a wider range of modulation than the traditional dHvA effect.