Impurity screening and Friedel oscillations in Floquet-driven two-dimensional metals
Department
Physics
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
8-3-2022
Abstract
We develop a theory for the non-equilibrium screening of a charged impurity in a two-dimensional electron system under a strong time-periodic drive. Our analysis of the time-averaged polarization function and dielectric function reveals that Floquet driving modifies the screened impurity potential in two main regimes. In the weak drive regime, the time-averaged screened potential exhibits unconventional Friedel oscillations with multiple spatial periods contributed by a principal period modulated by higher-order periods, which are due to the emergence of additional Kohn anomalies in the polarization function. In the strong drive regime, the time-averaged impurity potential becomes almost unscreened and does not exhibit Friedel oscillations. This tunable Friedel oscillations is a result of the dynamic gating effect of the time-dependent driving field on the two-dimensional electron system.
Journal Title
Journal of Physics Condensed Matter
Journal ISSN
09538984
Volume
34
Issue
31
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
10.1088/1361-648X/ac709d