Direct Observation at Room Temperature of the Orthorhombic Weyl Semimetal Phase in Thin Epitaxial MoTe 2

The direct observation at room temperature (RT) of the noncentrosymmetric orthorhombic topological Weyl semimetal phase in epitaxial thin films of MoTe2 grown on InAs(111)/Si(111) substrates by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) is reported. The orthorhombic phase is typically found at lower temperatures but its observation at RT in this work is attributed to the enlarged lattice parameters, influenced by the substrate, which stabilize an interlayer antibonding state compatible with the orthorhombic stacking. First-principles calculations predict eight type II Weyl nodes which are located below (but near) the Fermi energy making them accessible to charge transport and creating the prospect for practical applications exploiting the nontrivial topological properties. The orthorhombic phase coexists with an unconventional triclinic layer stacking which is different than the monoclinic or orthorhombic structures but it is centrosymmetric and topologically trivial.