Light-Induced Ultrafast Glide-Mirror Symmetry Breaking in Black Phosphorus

Symmetry breaking plays an important role in the fields of physics, ranging from particle physics to condensed matter physics. In solid-state materials, phase transitions are deeply linked to the underlying symmetry breakings, resulting in a rich variety of emergent phases. Such symmetry breakings are often induced by controlling the chemical composition and temperature or applying an electric field, strain, etc. In this work, we demonstrate ultrafast glide-mirror symmetry breaking in black phosphorus through Floquet engineering. Upon near-resonance pumping, a light-induced full gap opening is observed at the glide-mirror symmetry protected nodal ring, suggesting light-induced breaking of the glide-mirror symmetry. Moreover, the full gap is observed only in the presence of the light-field and disappears almost instantaneously (≪100 fs) when the light-field is turned off, suggesting the ultrafast manipulation of the symmetry and its Floquet engineering origin. This work not only demonstrates light–matter interaction as an effective way to realize ultrafast symmetry breaking in solid-state materials but also moves forward toward the long-sought Floquet topological phases.