Magnetotransport of Cd3As2 thin films under a tilted magnetic field

The bulk Cd3As2 is a prototype Dirac semimetal and its thin films have been successfully fabricated in recent experiments. The subsequent magnetotransport studies revealed several exotic topological phases, such as two-dimensional (2D) topological insulator phase and 2D Weyl semimetal phase. Here, we make a theoretical study on the magnetotransport properties of Cd3As2 thin films under a tilted magnetic field. Within the effective $$k\cdot p$$ k · p model describing the low-energy excitations in Cd3As2, we find that when the out-of-plane magnetic field component is small, each $$n\ge 1$$ n ≥ 1 LLs own the twofold degeneracy, and the Hall plateau shows the odd-integer sequence; when the out-of-plane component increases, the LL spacings get enlarged, which breaks the twofold degeneracy of the LLs and leads to the integer sequence of the Hall plateaus. Therefore, our work could capture the main physics underlying the tilt angle-driven Hall plateau transitions that are observed in the experiment. Graphical abstract