Momentum-inversion symmetry breaking on the Fermi surface of magnetic topological insulators

Abstract

Magnetic topological insulators (MnBi$_2$Te$_4$)(Bi$_2$Te$_3$)$_n$ were anticipated to exhibit magnetic energy gaps while recent spectroscopic studies did not observe them. Thus, magnetism on the surface is under debate. In this work, we propose another symmetry criterion to probe the surface magnetism. Because of both time-reversal symmetry-breaking and inversion symmetry-breaking, we demonstrate that the surface band structure violates momentum-inversion symmetry and leads to a three-fold rather than six-fold rotational symmetry on the Fermi surface if corresponding surface states couple strongly to the surface magnetism. Such a momentum-inversion symmetry violation is significant along the $\Gamma-K$ direction for surface bands on the (0001) plane.