Using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy, a 3D Dirac semimetal phase has been observed in Cadmium Arsenide for the first time.

We have studied the electronic structure of the nonmagnetic LiFeAs (Tc$\sim${}18\,\,K) superconductor using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy. We find a notable absence of the Fermi surface nesting, strong renormalization of the conduction bands by a factor of 3, high density of states at the Fermi level caused by a van Hove singularity, and no evidence for either a static or a fluctuating order except superconductivity with in-plane isotropic energy gaps. Our observations suggest that these electronic properties capture the majority of ingredients necessary for the superconductivity in iron pnictides.

In metallic condensed matter systems two different types of Weyl fermions can in principle emerge, with either a vanishing (type-I) or with a finite (type-II) density of states at the Weyl node energy. So far only ${\mathrm{WTe}}_2$ and ${\mathrm{MoTe}}_2$ were predicted to be type-II Weyl semimetals. Here we identify ${\mathrm{TaIrTe}}_4$ as a third member of this family of topological semimetals. ${\mathrm{TaIrTe}}_4$ has the attractive feature that it hosts only four well-separated Weyl points, the minimum imposed by symmetry. Moreover, the resulting topological surface states—Fermi arcs connecting Weyl nodes of opposite chirality—extend to about 1/3 of the surface Brillouin zone. This large momentum-space separation is very favorable for detecting the Fermi arcs spectroscopically and in transport experiments.

Spectroscopic detection of Dirac and Weyl fermions in real materials is vital for both, promising applications and fundamental bridge between high-energy and condensed-matter physics. While the presence of Dirac and noncentrosymmetric Weyl fermions is well established in many materials, the magnetic Weyl semimetals still escape direct experimental detection. In order to find a time-reversal symmetry breaking Weyl state we design two materials and present here experimental and theoretical evidence of realization of such a state in one of them, YbMnBi₂. We model the time-reversal symmetry breaking observed by magnetization and magneto-optical microscopy measurements by canted antiferromagnetism and find a number of Weyl points. Using angle-resolved photoemission, we directly observe two pairs of Weyl points connected by the Fermi arcs. Our results not only provide a fundamental link between the two areas of physics, but also demonstrate the practical way to design novel materials with exotic properties.