Dirac semimetals have attracted extensive attentions in recent years. It has been theoretically suggested that many-body interactions may drive exotic phase transitions, spontaneously generating a Dirac mass for the nominally massless Dirac electrons. So far, signature of interaction-driven transition has been lacking. In this work, we report high-magnetic-field transport measurements of the Dirac semimetal candidate ZrTe₅. Owing to the large g factor in ZrTe₅, the Zeeman splitting can be observed at magnetic field as low as 3 T. Most prominently, high pulsed magnetic field up to 60 T drives the system into the ultra-quantum limit, where we observe abrupt changes in the magnetoresistance, indicating field-induced phase transitions. This is interpreted as an interaction-induced spontaneous mass generation of the Dirac fermions, which bears resemblance to the dynamical mass generation of nucleons in high-energy physics. Our work establishes Dirac semimetals as ideal platforms for investigating emerging correlation effects in topological matters.

Recently, layered two-dimensional ferromagnetic materials (2D FMs) have attracted a great deal of interest for developing low-dimensional magnetic and spintronic devices. Mechanically exfoliated 2D FMs were discovered to possess ferromagnetism down to monolayer. It is therefore of great importance to investigate the distinct magnetic properties at low dimensionality. Here, we report the wafer-scale growth of 2D ferromagnetic thin films of Fe₃GeTe₂ via molecular beam epitaxy, and their exotic magnetic properties can be manipulated via the Fe composition and the interface coupling with antiferromagnetic MnTe. A 2D layer-by-layer growth mode has been achieved by in situ reflection high-energy electron diffraction oscillations, yielding a well-defined interlayer distance of 0.82 nm along {002} surface. The magnetic easy axis is oriented along c-axis with a Curie temperature of 216.4 K. Remarkably, the Curie temperature can be enhanced when raising the Fe composition. Upon coupling with MnTe, the coercive field dramatically increases 50% from 0.65 to 0.94 Tesla. The large-scale layer-by-layer growth and controllable magnetic properties make Fe₃GeTe₂ a promising candidate for spintronic applications. It also opens up unprecedented opportunities to explore rich physics when coupled with other 2D superconductors and topological matters.

Pulsed lasers operating in the mid-infrared (3–20 μm) are important for a wide range of applications in sensing, spectroscopy, imaging and communications. Despite recent advances with mid-infrared gain platforms, the lack of a capable pulse generation mechanism remains a significant technological challenge. Here we show that bulk Dirac fermions in molecular beam epitaxy grown crystalline Cd₃As₂, a three-dimensional topological Dirac semimetal, constitutes an exceptional ultrafast optical switching mechanism for the mid-infrared. Significantly, we show robust and effective tuning of the scattering channels of Dirac fermions via an element doping approach, where photocarrier relaxation times are found flexibly controlled over an order of magnitude (from 8 ps to 800 fs at 4.5 μm). Our findings reveal the strong impact of Cr doping on ultrafast optical properties in Cd₃As₂ and open up the long sought parameter space crucial for the development of compact and high-performance mid-infrared ultrafast sources.

Owing to the coupling between open Fermi arcs on opposite surfaces, topological Dirac semimetals exhibit a new type of cyclotron orbit in the surface states known as Weyl orbit. Here, by lowering the carrier density in Cd₃As₂ nanoplates, we observe a crossover from multiple-frequency to single-frequency Shubnikov–de Haas (SdH) oscillations when subjected to out-of-plane magnetic field, indicating the dominant role of surface transport. With the increase of magnetic field, the SdH oscillations further develop into quantum Hall state with non-vanishing longitudinal resistance. By tracking the oscillation frequency and Hall plateau, we observe a Zeeman-related splitting and extract the Landau level index as well as sub-band number. Different from conventional two-dimensional systems, this unique quantum Hall effect may be related to the quantized version of Weyl orbits. Our results call for further investigations into the exotic quantum Hall states in the low-dimensional structure of topological semimetals.