Magnetic-Resonance-Induced Pseudo-electric Field and Giant Current Response in Axion Insulators

Abstract

A quantized version of the magnetoelectric effect, known as the topological magnetoelectric effect, can exist in a time-reversal invariant topological insulator with all its surface states gapped out by magnetism. This topological phase, called the axion insulator phase, has been theoretically proposed but is still lack of conclusive experimental evidence due to the small signal of topological magnetoelectric effect. In this work, we propose that the dynamical in-plane magnetization in an axion insulator can generate a "pseudo-electric field", which acts on the surface state of topological insulator films and leads to the non-zero response current. Strikingly, we find that the current at magnetic resonance (either ferromagnetic or anti-ferromagnetic) is larger than that of topological magnetoelectric effect by several orders of magnitude, and thereby serves as a feasible smoking gun to confirm the axion insulator phase in the candidate materials.