There is, I think, something ethereal about i —the square root of minus one. I remember first hearing about it at school. It seemed an odd beast at that time—an intruder hovering on the edge of reality.

Usually familiarity dulls this sense of the bizarre, but in the case of i it was the reverse: over the years the sense of its surreal nature intensified. It seemed that it was impossible to write mathematics that described the real world in …

I and i

다중혈관 관상동맥 환자에서 y-문합을 이용하여 양쪽 내흉동맥만을 사용한 우회술의 조기 성적

Topological insulators are new states of quantum matter which cannot be adiabatically connected to conventional insulators and semiconductors. They are characterized by a full insulating gap in the bulk and gapless edge or surface states which are protected by time-reversal symmetry. These topological materials have been theoretically predicted and experimentally observed in a variety of systems, including HgTe quantum wells, BiSb alloys, and Bi2Te3 and Bi2Se3 crystals. Theoretical models, materials properties, and experimental results on two-dimensional and three-dimensional topological insulators are reviewed, and both the topological band theory and the topological field theory are discussed. Topological superconductors have a full pairing gap in the bulk and gapless surface states consisting of Majorana fermions. The theory of topological superconductors is reviewed, in close analogy to the theory of topological insulators.

/pdf/topological-insulators-and-superconductors-2nf6p2217g.pdf

Topological insulators and superconductors

We show that the quantum spin Hall (QSH) effect, a state of matter with topological properties distinct from those of conventional insulators, can be realized in mercury telluride–cadmium telluride semiconductor quantum wells. When the thickness of the quantum well is varied, the electronic state changes from a normal to an “inverted” type at a critical thickness d c . We show that this transition is a topological quantum phase transition between a conventional insulating phase and a phase exhibiting the QSH effect with a single pair of helical edge states. We also discuss methods for experimental detection of the QSH effect.

Quantum Spin Hall Effect and Topological Phase Transition in HgTe Quantum Wells

Topological insulators are new states of quantum matter in which surface states residing in the bulk insulating gap of such systems are protected by time-reversal symmetry. The study of such states was originally inspired by the robustness to scattering of conducting edge states in quantum Hall systems. Recently, such analogies have resulted in the discovery of topologically protected states in two-dimensional and three-dimensional band insulators with large spin–orbit coupling. So far, the only known three-dimensional topological insulator is BixSb1−x, which is an alloy with complex surface states. Here, we present the results of first-principles electronic structure calculations of the layered, stoichiometric crystals Sb2Te3, Sb2Se3, Bi2Te3 and Bi2Se3. Our calculations predict that Sb2Te3, Bi2Te3 and Bi2Se3 are topological insulators, whereas Sb2Se3 is not. These topological insulators have robust and simple surface states consisting of a single Dirac cone at the Γ point. In addition, we predict that Bi2Se3 has a topologically non-trivial energy gap of 0.3 eV, which is larger than the energy scale of room temperature. We further present a simple and unified continuum model that captures the salient topological features of this class of materials. First-principles calculations predict that Bi2Se3, Bi2Te3 and Sb2Te3 are topological insulators—three-dimensional semiconductors with unusual surface states generated by spin–orbit coupling—whose surface states are described by a single gapless Dirac cone. The calculations further predict that Bi2Se3 has a non-trivial energy gap larger than the energy scale kBT at room temperature.

http://english.iop.cas.cn/rh/rp/200907/U020090713606192151652.pdf

Topological insulators in Bi2Se3, Bi2Te3 and Sb2Te3 with a single Dirac cone on the surface

Certain insulators have exotic metallic states on their surfaces. These states are formed by topological effects that also render the electrons travelling on such surfaces insensitive to scattering by impurities. Such topological insulators may provide new routes to generating novel phases and particles, possibly finding uses in technological applications in spintronics and quantum computing.

/pdf/the-birth-of-topological-insulators-4p6rpx5np4.pdf

The birth of topological insulators

The topological invariants of a time-reversal-invariant band structure in two dimensions are multiple copies of the ${\mathbb{Z}}_{2}$ invariant found by Kane and Mele. Such invariants protect the ``topological insulator'' phase and give rise to a spin Hall effect carried by edge states. Each pair of bands related by time reversal is described by one ${\mathbb{Z}}_{2}$ invariant, up to one less than half the dimension of the Bloch Hamiltonians. In three dimensions, there are four such invariants per band pair. The ${\mathbb{Z}}_{2}$ invariants of a crystal determine the transitions between ordinary and topological insulators as its bands are occupied by electrons. We derive these invariants using maps from the Brillouin zone to the space of Bloch Hamiltonians and clarify the connections between ${\mathbb{Z}}_{2}$ invariants, the integer invariants that underlie the integer quantum Hall effect, and previous invariants of $\mathcal{T}$-invariant Fermi systems.

Topological invariants of time-reversal-invariant band structures

/pdf/topological-invariants-of-time-reversal-invariant-band-3ybwb961qe.pdf

An important and incompletely answered question is whether a closed quantum system of many interacting particles can be localized by disorder. The time evolution of simple (unentangled) initial states is studied numerically for a system of interacting spinless fermions in one dimension described by the random-field $XXZ$ Hamiltonian. Interactions induce a dramatic change in the propagation of entanglement and a smaller change in the propagation of particles. For even weak interactions, when the system is thought to be in a many-body localized phase, entanglement shows neither localized nor diffusive behavior but grows without limit in an infinite system: interactions act as a singular perturbation on the localized state with no interactions. The significance for proposed atomic experiments is that local measurements will show a large but nonthermal entropy in the many-body localized state. This entropy develops slowly (approximately logarithmically) over a diverging time scale as in glassy systems.

Unbounded Growth of Entanglement in Models of Many-Body Localization

The orbital motion of electrons in a three-dimensional solid can generate a pseudoscalar magnetoelectric coupling $\ensuremath{\theta}$, a fact we derive for the single-particle case using a recent theory of polarization in weakly inhomogeneous materials. This polarizability $\ensuremath{\theta}$ is the same parameter that appears in the ``axion electrodynamics'' Lagrangian $\ensuremath{\Delta}{\mathcal{L}}_{EM}=(\ensuremath{\theta}{e}^{2}/2\ensuremath{\pi}h)\mathbf{E}\ifmmode\cdot\else\textperiodcentered\fi{}\mathbf{B}$, which is known to describe the unusual magnetoelectric properties of the three-dimensional topological insulator ($\ensuremath{\theta}=\ensuremath{\pi}$). We compute $\ensuremath{\theta}$ for a simple model that accesses the topological insulator and discuss its connection to the surface Hall conductivity. The orbital magnetoelectric polarizability can be generalized to the many-particle wave function and defines the 3D topological insulator, like the integer quantum Hall effect, in terms of a topological ground-state response function.

/pdf/magnetoelectric-polarizability-and-axion-electrodynamics-in-qzqcoeulrx.pdf

Joel E. Moore

Papers

The birth of topological insulators

Topological invariants of time-reversal-invariant band structures

Topological invariants of time-reversal-invariant band structures

Unbounded Growth of Entanglement in Models of Many-Body Localization

Magnetoelectric polarizability and axion electrodynamics in crystalline insulators