Intrinsic Anomalous Hall Conductivity in a Nonuniform Electric Field.

We study how the intrinsic anomalous Hall conductivity is modified in two-dimensional crystals with broken time-reversal symmetry due to weak inhomogeneity of the applied electric field. Focusing on a clean noninteracting two-band system without band crossings, we derive the general expression for the Hall conductivity at small finite wave vector q to order q^{2}, which governs the Hall response to the second gradient of the electric field. Using the Kubo formula, we show that the answer can be expressed through the Berry curvature, Fubini-Study quantum metric, and the rank-3 symmetric tensor which is related to the quantum geometric connection and physically corresponds to the gauge-invariant part of the third cumulant of the position operator. We further compare our results with the predictions made within the semiclassical approach. By deriving the semiclassical equations of motion, we reproduce the result obtained from the Kubo formula in some limits. We also find, however, that the conventional semiclassical description in terms of the definite position and momentum of the electron is not fully consistent because of singular terms originating from the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. We thus present a clear example of a case when the semiclassical approach inherently suffers from the uncertainty principle, implying that it should be applied to systems in nonuniform fields with extra care.

Gyrotropic Magnetic Effect and the Magnetic Moment on the Fermi Surface.

The current density j^{B} induced in a clean metal by a slowly-varying magnetic field B is formulated as the low-frequency limit of natural optical activity, or natural gyrotropy. Working with a multiband Pauli Hamiltonian, we obtain from the Kubo formula a simple expression for α_{ij}^{GME}=j_{i}^{B}/B_{j} in terms of the intrinsic magnetic moment (orbital plus spin) of the Bloch electrons on the Fermi surface. An alternate semiclassical derivation provides an intuitive picture of the effect, and takes into account the influence of scattering processes in dirty metals. This "gyrotropic magnetic effect" is fundamentally different from the chiral magnetic effect driven by the chiral anomaly and governed by the Berry curvature on the Fermi surface, and the two effects are compared for a minimal model of a Weyl semimetal. Like the Berry curvature, the intrinsic magnetic moment should be regarded as a basic ingredient in the Fermi-liquid description of transport in broken-symmetry metals.

Optical gyrotropy from axion electrodynamics in momentum space.

Several emergent phenomena and phases in solids arise from configurations of the electronic Berry phase in momentum space that are similar to gauge field configurations in real space such as magnetic monopoles. We show that the momentum-space analogue of the "axion electrodynamics" term E·B plays a fundamental role in a unified theory of Berry-phase contributions to optical gyrotropy in time-reversal invariant materials and the chiral magnetic effect. The Berry-phase mechanism predicts that the rotatory power along the optic axes of a crystal must sum to zero, a constraint beyond that stipulated by point-group symmetry, but observed to high accuracy in classic experimental observations on alpha quartz. Furthermore, the Berry mechanism provides a microscopic basis for the surface conductance at the interface between gyrotropic and nongyrotropic media.