Splitting of the Zero-Energy Landau Level and Universal Dissipative Conductivity at Critical Points in Disordered Graphene

We report on robust features of the longitudinal conductivity (sigma(xx)) of the graphene zero-energy Landau level in the presence of disorder and varying magnetic fields. By mixing an Anderson disorder potential with a low density of sublattice impurities, the transition from metallic to insulating states is theoretically explored as a function of Landau-level splitting, using highly efficient real-space methods to compute the Kubo conductivities (both sigma(xx) and Hall sigma(xy)). As long as valley degeneracy is maintained, the obtained critical conductivity sigma(xx) similar or equal to 1.4e(2)/h is robust upon an increase in disorder (by almost 1 order of magnitude) and magnetic fields ranging from about 2 to 200 T. When the sublattice symmetry is broken, sigma(xx) eventually vanishes at the Dirac point owing to localization effects, whereas the critical conductivities of pseudospin-split states (dictating the width of a sigma(xy) = 0 plateau) change to sigma(xx) similar or equal to e(2)/h, regardless of the splitting strength, superimposed disorder, or magnetic strength. These findings point towards the nondissipative nature of the quantum Hall effect in disordered graphene in the presence of Landau level splitting. DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.110.086602