Nonlinear optical responses in nodal line semimetals

Abstract: Shift current and second harmonic generation (SHG) are nonlinear optical responses that are often used for photovoltaic effect and the detection of subtle symmetry breaking patterns in materials. It has been recently shown that topological semimetals such as Weyl semimetals with broken inversion symmetry can generate large nonlinear optical responses. In this paper, we investigate both shift current and SHG in a class of topological nodal line semimetal (NLSM) systems with broken inversion symmetry, which may arise intrinsically or via an applied electric field. It is shown that certain classes of NLSM systems offer more singular shift current and SHG in comparison to the well-known Weyl semimetal systems.