Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Floquet engineering of axion and high-Chern number phases in a topological insulator under illumination

  Mohammad Shafiei, Farhad Fazileh, François M. Peeters, Milorad V. Milošević

  SciPost Phys. Core 7, 024 (2024) · published 1 May 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Quantum anomalous Hall, high-Chern number, and axion phases in topological insulators are characterized by its Chern invariant C (respectively, C=1, integer C>1, and C=0 with half-quantized Hall conductance of opposite signs on top and bottom surfaces). They are of recent interest because of novel fundamental physics and prospective applications, but identifying and controlling these phases has been challenging in practice. Here we show that these states can be created and switched between in thin films of Bi$_2$Se$_3$ by Floquet engineering, using irradiation by circularly polarized light. We present the calculated phase diagrams of encountered topological phases in Bi$_2$Se$_3$, as a function of wavelength and amplitude of light, as well as sample thickness, after properly taking into account the penetration depth of light and the variation of the gap in the surface states. These findings open pathways towards energy-efficient optoelectronics, advanced sensing, quantum information processing and metrology.

• Monopoles in Dirac spin liquids and their symmetries from instanton calculus

  Shankar Ganesh, Joseph Maciejko

  SciPost Phys. 16, 118 (2024) · published 2 May 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The Dirac spin liquid (DSL) is a two-dimensional (2D) fractionalized Mott insulator featuring massless Dirac spinon excitations coupled to a compact U(1) gauge field, which allows for flux-tunneling instanton events described by magnetic monopoles in (2+1)D Euclidean spacetime. The state-operator correspondence of conformal field theory has been used recently to define associated monopole operators and determine their quantum numbers, which encode the microscopic symmetries of conventional ordered phases proximate to the DSL. In this work, we utilize semiclassical instanton methods not relying on conformal invariance to construct monopole operators directly in (2+1)D spacetime as instanton-induced 't Hooft vertices, i.e., fermion-number-violating effective interactions originating from zero modes of the Euclidean Dirac operator in an instanton background. In the presence of a flavor-adjoint fermion mass, resummation of the instanton gas is shown to select the correct monopole to be proliferated, in accordance with predictions of the state-operator correspondence. We also show that our instanton-based approach is able to determine monopole quantum numbers on bipartite lattices.

• Josephson effects between the Kitaev ladder superconductors

  Osamu Kanehira, Hiroki Tsuchiura

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 11, 014 (2023) · published 6 June 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The two-leg ladder system consisting of the Kitaev chains is known to exhibit a richer phase diagram than that of the single chain. We theoretically investigate the variety of the Josephson effects between the ladder systems. We consider the Josephson phase difference $\theta$ between these two ladder systems as well as the phase difference $\phi$ between the parallel chains in each ladder system. The total energy of the junction at $T = 0$ is calculated by a numerical diagonalization method as functions of $\theta$, $\phi$, and also a transverse hopping $t_{\perp}$ in the ladders. We find that, by controlling $t_{\perp}$ and $\phi$, the junction exhibits not only the fractional Josephson effect for the phase difference $\theta$, but also the usual 0-junction and even $\pi$-junction properties.

• Field-induced local Fermi-liquid states in the underscreened Kondo model for Eu compounds

  Shingo Kuniyoshi, Ryousuke Shiina

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 11, 015 (2023) · published 6 June 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We have studied an underscreened Kondo model for the impurity spin $S=7/2$ capturing the $4f$ characteristics of a nearly divalent Eu ion. By using the numerical renormalization group method, it is shown that an unusual heavy-fermion state is induced from the underscreened spin state when a weak crystal field is introduced. It is also found that the application of the magnetic field enhances the effective mass of the heavy fermions, reflecting the field-induced level crossing of the spin states. We will discuss the mechanism of these mass enhancements in terms of a realization of the two-stage Kondo effect.

• Phase transitions of wave packet dynamics in disordered non-Hermitian systems

  Helene Spring, Viktor Könye, Fabian A. Gerritsma, Ion Cosma Fulga, Anton R. Akhmerov

  SciPost Phys. 16, 120 (2024) · published 3 May 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Disorder can localize the eigenstates of one-dimensional non-Hermitian systems, leading to an Anderson transition with a critical exponent of 1. We show that, due to the lack of energy conservation, the dynamics of individual, real-space wave packets follows a different behavior. Both transitions between localization and unidirectional amplification, as well as transitions between distinct propagating phases become possible. The critical exponent of the transition is close to 1/2 in propagating-propagating and (de)localization transitions.

• Topological photonic band gaps in honeycomb atomic arrays

  Pierre Wulles, Sergey E. Skipetrov

  SciPost Phys. Core 7, 051 (2024) · published 7 August 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  lattice of two-level atoms coupled by the in-plane electromagnetic field may exhibit band gaps that can be opened either by applying an external magnetic field or by breaking the symmetry between the two triangular sublattices of which the honeycomb one is a superposition. We establish the conditions of band gap opening, compute the width of the gap, and characterize its topological property by a topological index (Chern number). The topological nature of the band gap leads to inversion of the population imbalance between the two triangular sublattices for modes with frequencies near band edges. It also prohibits a transition to the trivial limit of infinitely spaced, noninteracting atoms without closing the spectral gap. Surrounding the lattice by a Fabry-Pérot cavity with small intermirror spacing $d < \pi/k_0$, where $k_0$ is the free-space wave number at the atomic resonance frequency, renders the system Hermitian by suppressing the leakage of energy out of the atomic plane without modifying its topological properties. In contrast, a larger $d$ allows for propagating optical modes that are built up due to reflections at the cavity mirrors and have frequencies inside the band gap of the free-standing lattice, thus closing the latter.

• Higher-group symmetry of (3+1)D fermionic $\mathbb{Z}_2$ gauge theory: Logical CCZ, CS, and T gates from higher symmetry

  Maissam Barkeshli, Po-Shen Hsin, Ryohei Kobayashi

  SciPost Phys. 16, 122 (2024) · published 7 May 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  It has recently been understood that the complete global symmetry of finite group topological gauge theories contains the structure of a higher-group. Here we study the higher-group structure in (3+1)D $\mathbb{Z}_2$ gauge theory with an emergent fermion, and point out that pumping chiral $p+ip$ topological states gives rise to a $\mathbb{Z}_{8}$ 0-form symmetry with mixed gravitational anomaly. This ordinary symmetry mixes with the other higher symmetries to form a 3-group structure, which we examine in detail. We then show that in the context of stabilizer quantum codes, one can obtain logical CCZ and CS gates by placing the code on a discretization of $T^3$ (3-torus) and $T^2 \rtimes_{C_2} S^1$ (2-torus bundle over the circle) respectively, and pumping $p+ip$ states. Our considerations also imply the possibility of a logical $T$ gate by placing the code on $\mathbb{RP}^3$ and pumping a $p+ip$ topological state.