Unconventional chiral charge order in kagome superconductor KV3Sb5

Jiang, Yu-Xiao; Yin, Jia-Xin; Denner, M Michael; Shumiya, Nana; Ortiz, Brenden R; Xu, Gang; Guguchia, Zurab; He, Junyi; Hossain, Md Shafayat; Liu, Xiaoxiong; Ruff, Jacob; Kautzsch, Linus; Zhang, Songtian S; Chang, Guoqing; Belopolski, Ilya; Zhang, Qi; Cochran, Tyler A; Multer, Daniel; Litskevich, Maksim; Cheng, Zi-Jia

doi:10.1038/s41563-021-01034-y

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Jiang, Y.-X., Yin, J.-X., Denner, M. M., Shumiya, N., Ortiz, B. R., Xu, G., Guguchia, Z., He, J., Hossain, M. S., Liu, X., Ruff, J., Kautzsch, L., Zhang, S. S., Chang, G., Belopolski, I., Zhang, Q., Cochran, T. A., Multer, D., Litskevich, M., … Hasan, M. Z. (2021). Unconventional chiral charge order in kagome superconductor KV3Sb5. Nature Materials, 20(10), 1353–1357. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-021-01034-y

Abstract

Intertwining quantum order and non-trivial topology is at the frontier of condensed matter physics1,2,3,4. A charge-density-wave-like order with orbital currents has been proposed for achieving the quantum anomalous Hall effect5,6 in topological materials and for the hidden phase in cuprate high-temperature superconductors7,8. However, the experimental realization of such an order is challenging. Here we use high-resolution scanning tunnelling microscopy to discover an unconventional chiral charge order in a kagome material, KV3Sb5, w