Engineering the in-plane anomalous hall effect in Cd$_3$As$_2$ thin films

Wangqian Miao, Binghao Guo, Susanne Stemmer, Xi Dai

Published 2023-09-27Version 1

We predict two topological phase transitions for cadmium arsenide (Cd$_3$As$_2$) thin films, taking advantage of a four-band $k\cdot p$ model and effective $g$ factors calculated from first principles. Film thickness, growth direction, in-plane Zeeman coupling strength and moir\'e superlattice potential can all serve as control parameters to drive these phase transitions. For (001) oriented Cd$_3$As$_2$ thin films, a two dimensional Weyl semimetal phase protected by $C_{2z} T$ symmetry can be realized using an in-plane magnetic field, which has recently been reported in our companion paper [PhysRevLett.131.046601]. We then put forth two pathways to achieve in-plane anomalous Hall effects (IPAHE). By either introducing a $C_3$-symmetric moir\'e superlattice potential or altering the growth orientation, the emergent $C_{2z} T$ symmetry can be broken. Consequently, in the clean limit and at low temperatures, quantized Hall plateaus induced by in-plane Zeeman fields become observable.