Intrinsic orbital Hall effect in a nonuniform electric field

Abstract

Geometric analysis of electronic Bloch states offers a universal framework for understanding electronic properties, yet its role in the transport of orbital angular momentum remains unexplored. In this work, we establish an analytic connection between orbital angular momentum transport and the geometric properties of Bloch wave functions in electronic systems. Focusing on the intrinsic orbital Hall effect in the dc limit under a spatially nonuniform electric field, we show that its conductivity can be expressed in terms of universal geometric quantities, such as the orbital Berry curvature and quantum metric. This formulation provides a term-by-term correspondence with the geometric description of intrinsic charge Hall transport established in previous studies. Using a tight-binding model, we further illustrate that the higher-order orbital Hall response can exhibit enhanced sensitivity to the orientation of an anisotropic sample. Our work deepens the understanding of diverse intrinsic transverse transport phenomena and the role of quantum geometry in electronic systems.