Magic Angle Butterfly in Twisted Trilayer Graphene

Abstract

We consider a configuration of three stacked graphene monolayers with commensurate twist angles $\theta_{12}/\theta_{23}=p/q$, where $p$ and $q$ are coprime integers with $0<p<|q|$ and $q$ can be positive or negative. We study this system using the continuum model in the chiral limit when interlayer coupling terms between $\textrm{AA}_{12}$ and $\textrm{AA}_{23}$ sites of the moir\'{e} patterns $12$ and $23$ are neglected. There are only three inequivalent displacements between the moir\'{e} patterns $12$ and $23$, at which the three monolayers' Dirac zero modes are protected. Remarkably, for these displacements and an arbitrary $p/q$ we discover exactly flat bands at an infinite set of twist angles (magic angles). We provide theoretical explanation and classification of all possible configurations and topologies of the flat bands.