On the universal absorption of two-dimensional systems

T. Stauber, D. Noriega-Perez, J. Schliemann

Published 2014-12-18Version 1

We discuss the optical conductivity of several non-interacting two-dimensional (2D) semiconducting systems focusing on gapped Dirac and Schr\"odinger fermions as well as on a system mixing these two types. Close to the band-gap, we can define a universal optical conductivity quantum of $\sigma_0=\frac{1}{16}\frac{e^2}{\hbar}$ for the pure systems. The effective optical conductivity then depends on the degeneracy factors $g_s$ (spin) and $g_v$ (valley) and on the curvature around the band-gap $\nu$, i.e., it generally reads $\sigma=g_sg_v\nu\sigma_0$. For a system composed of both types of carriers, the optical conductivity becomes non-universal.