English

Disorder effect on 3-dimensional $Z_2$ quantum spin Hall systems

Disordered Systems and Neural Networks 2009-11-13 v3 Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics

Abstract

In this paper, we studied the nonmagnetic disorder effects onto the quantum critical point (QCP) which intervenes an ordinary insulator and the 3-dimensional Z2Z_2 quantum spin Hall insulator. The minimal model describing this QCP is the single-copy of the 3+1 Dirac fermion, whose topological mass mm induces the quantum phase transition. We derived the phase diagram spanned by this mass-term mm, chemical potential μ\mu and strength of the disorder within the self-consistent Born approximation. To infer the structure of the low-energy effective theory, we further calculated the weak localization (WL) correction to the conductivity. By way of this, we have found that the diffuson consists of the two quasi-degenerate contributions having the diffusion pole; one always behaves as the diffusion mode. The other becomes the massless mode only at m=0m=0. Based on this "two-mode picture", we will discuss the possible microscopic picture of the "levitation and pair annihilation" phenomena, recently discovered by Onoda et al.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0808.1328,
  title  = {Disorder effect on 3-dimensional $Z_2$ quantum spin Hall systems},
  author = {Ryuichi Shindou and Shuichi Murakami},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0808.1328},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

30 pages submitted to PRB. The standard WL calculation based on the Kubo formula is newly included, while the previous mode-mode coupling calculations are transferred to the appendices. The physical meaning of the "two-modes" is also made explicit

R2 v1 2026-06-21T11:09:02.029Z