Ultrafast scattering dynamics of coherent phonons in Bi${}_{1-x}$Sb${}_x$ in the Weyl semimetal phase

We investigate ultrafast phonon dynamics in the Bi${}_{1-x}$Sb${}_x$ alloy system for various compositions $x$ using a reflective femtosecond pump-probe technique. The coherent optical phonons corresponding to the A${}_{1g}$ local vibrational modes of Bi-Bi, Bi-Sb, and Sb-Sb are generated and observed in the time domain with a few picoseconds dephasing time. The frequencies of the coherent optical phonons were found to change as the Sb composition $x$ was varied, and more importantly, the relaxation time of those phonon modes was dramatically reduced for $x$ values in the range 0.5–0.8. We argue that the phonon relaxation dynamics are not simply governed by alloy scattering, but are significantly modified by anharmonic phonon-phonon scattering with implied minor contributions from electron-phonon scattering in a Weyl-semimetal phase.