English

Realization of a parity-violating antiferromagnetic state in LaMnSi

Materials Science 2026-05-20 v1

Abstract

Spontaneous symmetry breaking underlies functional electronic phenomena in quantum materials. Breaking space-inversion (P\mathcal{P}) or time-reversal (T\mathcal{T}) symmetry can generate spin-split electronic bands central to modern spintronics. By contrast, parity-violating antiferromagnetic (AFM) order breaks both P\mathcal{P} and T\mathcal{T} while preserving the combined PT\mathcal{PT} symmetry, enabling spin-degenerate yet momentum-asymmetric electronic bands. This momentum asymmetry has been proposed as a microscopic origin of unconventional nonreciprocal and nonlinear responses but its experimental verification has remained challenging because it requires establishing both the symmetry-breaking magnetic order and the associated electronic structure. Here we combine soft x-ray angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) and polarization-resolved optical second-harmonic generation (SHG) microscopy to study LaMnSi, a candidate parity-violating AFM metal. Soft x-ray ARPES resolves the three-dimensional bulk band structures in agreement with density functional theory calculations for the AFM phase, whereas SHG microscopy detects sign-reversing nonlinear optical responses from opposite AFM domains that carry T\mathcal{T}-odd parity-violating order. Together, these results provide direct evidence for parity-violating AFM state in LaMnSi, establish LaMnSi as a parity-violating AFM metal, and identify this class of AFMs as a promising platform for symmetry-controlled nonreciprocal and nonlinear electronic responses.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2605.19891,
  title  = {Realization of a parity-violating antiferromagnetic state in LaMnSi},
  author = {Takuma Iwata and K. Shiraishi and T. Aoyama and D. Senba and T. Takeda and Y. Fujisawa and M. Nurmamat and K. Nakanishi and K. Yamagami and M. Arita and T. Yamada and Y. Yanagi and A. Kimura and H. Tanida and Kenta Kuroda},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2605.19891},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

11 pages, 5 figures, Supplementary Information