Generating a Topological Anomalous Hall Effect in a Nonmagnetic Conductor: An In-Plane Magnetic Field as a Direct Probe of the Berry Curvature.

ABSTRACT

We demonstrate that the Berry curvature monopole of nonmagnetic two-dimensional spin-3/2 holes leads to a novel Hall effect linear in an applied in-plane magnetic field B_{∥}. Remarkably, all scalar and spin-dependent disorder contributions vanish to leading order in B_{∥}, while there is no Lorentz force and hence no ordinary Hall effect. This purely intrinsic phenomenon, which we term the anomalous planar Hall effect (APHE), provides a direct transport probe of the Berry curvature accessible in all p-type semiconductors. We discuss experimental setups for its measurement.