English

Periodic Table for Topological Bands with Non-Hermitian Bernard-LeClair Symmetries

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics 2019-06-12 v2 Optics Quantum Physics

Abstract

Classifications of symmetry-protected topological (SPT) phases provide a framework to systematically understand the physical properties and potential applications of topological systems. While such classifications have been widely explored in the context of Hermitian systems, a complete understanding of the roles of more general non-Hermitian symmetries and their associated classification is still lacking. Here, we derive a periodic table for non-interacting SPTs with general non-Hermitian symmetries. Our analysis reveals novel non-Hermitian topological classes, while also naturally incorporating the entire classification of Hermitian systems as a special case of our scheme. Building on top of these results, we derive two independent generalizations of Kramers' theorem to the non-Hermitian setting, which constrain the spectra of the system and lead to new topological invariants. To elucidate the physics behind the periodic table, we provide explicit examples of novel non-Hermitian topological invariants, focusing on the symmetry classes in zero, one and two dimensions with new topological classifications (e.g. Z\mathbb{Z} in 0D, Z2\mathbb{Z}_2 in 1D, 2D). These results thus provide a framework for the design and engineering of non-Hermitian symmetry-protected topological systems.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1812.10490,
  title  = {Periodic Table for Topological Bands with Non-Hermitian Bernard-LeClair Symmetries},
  author = {Hengyun Zhou and Jong Yeon Lee},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1812.10490},
  year   = {2019}
}

Comments

19 pages, 4 figures, comments welcome. V2: updated references and notes