English

Part II: Witten effect and $\mathbb{Z}$-classification of axion angle $\theta=n \pi$

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics 2022-10-04 v2 Materials Science Strongly Correlated Electrons High Energy Physics - Lattice High Energy Physics - Theory

Abstract

The non-trivial third homotopy class of three-dimensional topological insulators leads to quantized, magneto-electric coefficient or axion angle θ=nπ\theta= n \pi, with nZn \in \mathbb{Z}. In Part I, we developed tools for computing nn from a staggered symmetry-indicator κAF,j\kappa_{AF,j} and Wilson loops of non-Abelian, Berry connection in momentum-space, which clearly distinguished between magneto-electrically trivial (n=0n=0), and non-trivial (n=2sn=2s) topological crystalline insulators. In this work, we perform Z\mathbb{Z}-classification of real-space, topological response or θ\theta by carrying out thought experiments with magnetic, Dirac monopoles. We demonstrate this for non-magnetic and magnetic topological insulators by computing induced electric charge on monopoles or Witten effect. We show that both first- and higher- order topological insulators can exhibit quantized, magneto-electric response, irrespective of the presence of gapless surface-states, and corner-states. Special attention is paid to the response of octupolar higher-order topological insulator, which was originally predicted to be magneto-electrically trivial. The important roles of fermion zero-modes, CP\mathcal{CP}, and flavor symmetries are critically addressed. Our work outlines a unified theoretical framework for addressing dc topological response and topological quantum phase transitions, which cannot be reliably predicted by symmetry-based classification scheme.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2206.10636,
  title  = {Part II: Witten effect and $\mathbb{Z}$-classification of axion angle $\theta=n \pi$},
  author = {Alexander C. Tyner and Pallab Goswami},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2206.10636},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

23 pages, 16 figures; updated title, abstract and reference; for calculation of 3D winding number from band structure in momentum space, please consult Part I (arXiv:2109.06871v2; https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2109.06871)