D-instanton effects on the holographic Weyl semimetals

Abstract

We investigate the effects of D-instantons on a holographic Weyl semimetal in a top-down approach. We find that the presence of D-instantons induces a novel phase transition from a Weyl semimetal to a gapped phase, providing a new mechanism for gap formation in strongly coupled systems. By analyzing the free energy of probe D7-brane embeddings, we construct the phase diagram in terms of the fermion mass, instanton density, and temperature, measured in units of the Weyl parameter. We show that, in addition to the conventional mass-driven transition associated with band inversion, the instanton density gives rise to a qualitatively different transition whose mechanism cannot be understood within the standard Dirac picture. We compute nonlinear electric conductivities from the regularity condition at the black hole horizon and demonstrate that the two types of transitions exhibit distinct transport behavior. In particular, the instanton-induced transition leads to a gapped phase with properties that differ from the conventional insulating phase. We also discuss possible interpretations of this phase in the boundary theory and comment on its relation to nonperturbative effects in strongly interacting systems.