Terahertz radiation induced photocurrents in graphene subjected to an in-plane magnetic field

• We report on the observation of terahertz radiation induced photocurrents in single-layer graphene samples subjected to an in-plane magnetic field. The photosignal is observed for both, linearly and circularly polarized radiation. A remarkable effect is that the current inverts its sign not only by switching the magnetic field direction, but as well by changing the radiation helicity from left- to right-handedness. We demonstrate that the photocurrent stems from strong structure inversion asymmetry (SIA) of samples originating from the presence of substrate and/or adatoms on graphene. The analysis shows that the observed effect represents a new type of ratchet effects: magnetic field induced ratchets. A microscopic theory of the observed effect is developed being in a good qualitative agreement with the experiment. Furthermore, the experiments open a promising access to the investigation of SIA which is of particular interest for the understanding of graphene properties as well as applications.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Fysik (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Physical Sciences (hsv//eng)

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