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arXiv:1312.7782 · Journal of Physics Condensed Matter

Entanglement entropy and entanglement spectrum of triplet topological superconductors

T P Oliveira, P Ribeiro, Pedro D Sacramento

Published Oct 2, 2014• 15 citations
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Abstract

We analyze the entanglement entropy properties of a 2D p-wave superconductor with Rashba spin-orbit coupling, which displays a rich phase-space that supports non-trivial topological phases, as the chemical potential and the Zeeman term are varied. We show that the entanglement entropy and its derivatives clearly signal the topological transitions and we find numerical evidence that for this model the derivative with respect to the magnetization provides a sensible signature of each topological phase. Following the area law for the entanglement entropy, we systematically analyze the contributions that are proportional to or independent of the perimeter of the system, as a function of the Hamiltonian coupling constants and the geometry of the finite subsystem. For this model, we show that even though the topological entanglement entropy vanishes, it signals the topological phase transitions in a finite system. We also observe a relationship between a topological contribution to the entanglement entropy in a half-cylinder geometry and the number of edge states, and that the entanglement spectrum has robust modes associated with each edge state, as in other topological systems.

DOI
10.1088/0953-8984/26/42/425702

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We analyze the entanglement entropy properties of a 2D p-wave superconductor with Rashba spin-orbit coupling, which displays a rich phase-space that supports non-trivial topological phases, as the chemical potential and the Zeeman term are varied. We show that the entanglement entropy and its derivatives clearly signal the topological transitions and we find numerical evidence that for this model the derivative with respect to the magnetization provides a sensible signature of each topological phase. Following the area law for the entanglement entropy, we systematically analyze the contributions that are proportional to or independent of the perimeter of the system, as a function of the Hamiltonian coupling constants and the geometry of the finite subsystem. For this model, we show that even though the topological entanglement entropy vanishes, it signals the topological phase transitions in a finite system. We also observe a relationship between a topological contribution to the entanglement entropy in a half-cylinder geometry and the number of edge states, and that the entanglement spectrum has robust modes associated with each edge state, as in other topological systems.
We analyze the entanglement entropy properties of a 2D p-wave superconductor with Rashba spin-orbit coupling, which displays a rich phase-space that supports non-trivial topological phases, as the chemical potential and the Zeeman term are varied. We show that the entanglement entropy and its derivatives clearly signal the topological transitions and we find numerical evidence that for this model the derivative with respect to the magnetization provides a sensible signature of each topological phase. Following the area law for the entanglement entropy, we systematically analyze the contributions that are proportional to or independent of the perimeter of the system, as a function of the Hamiltonian coupling constants and the geometry of the finite subsystem. For this model, we show that even though the topological entanglement entropy vanishes, it signals the topological phase transitions in a finite system. We also observe a relationship between a topological contribution to the entanglement entropy in a half-cylinder geometry and the number of edge states, and that the entanglement spectrum has robust modes associated with each edge state, as in other topological systems.
Topological insulators and topological superconductors display various topological phases that are characterized by different Chern numbers or by gapless edge states. In this work we show that various quantum information methods such as the von Neumann entropy, entanglement spectrum, fidelity, and fidelity spectrum may be used to detect and distinguish topological phases and their transitions. As an example we consider a two-dimensional ppp-wave superconductor, with Rashba spin-orbit coupling and a Zeeman term. The nature of the phases and their changes are clarified by the eigenvectors of the kkk-space reduced density matrix. We show that in the topologically nontrivial phases the highest weight eigenvector is fully aligned with the triplet pairing state. A signature of the various phase transitions between two points on the parameter space is encoded in the kkk-space fidelity operator.
Entanglement signatures of gapless topological phases in a ppp-wave superconductor
We explore the gapless topological phases of a ppp-wave superconductor, probing its rich topologically ordered phases and underlying quantum phenomena. The topological order of the system is characterized by studying its entanglement properties. This study confirms the bulk-boundary correspondence in the entanglement spectrum, even without a full bulk gap. For contractible bipartitions, the entanglement entropy varies non-monotonically with the chemical potential, displaying pronounced peaks at points where the bulk gap closes and reopens, signaling topological quantum phase transitions. This behavior remains robust in the thermodynamic limit. The entanglement entropy grows with system size for non-contractible bipartitions, indicating long-range entanglement in the gapless phase. These findings reveal the subtle interplay between symmetry, entanglement, and topology in gapless systems, and emphasize the role of entanglement-based diagnostics in identifying unconventional topological phases beyond the gapped paradigm.
In this work we study a two-dimensional topological superconductor on a square lattice. It contains hopping, spin-orbit coupling and a time reversal symmetry breaking Zeeman term. This realizes, in combination with a singlet pairing term, an effective triplet pairing that leads to a topological superconductor. As previously found numerically, the transitions are seen in the entanglement entropy as cusps as a function of model parameters. We complement this through studying the entanglement entropy analytically by keeping only its most important components. Our study is based on the intuition that the number of Fermi surfaces in the system controls the topological invariant. With our approximate expression for the entanglement entropy we are able to extract the divergent entanglement entropy derivative close to the phase transition.
In this paper we study the phase diagram of a disordered, spin-orbit coupled superconductor with sss-wave or d+idd+idd+id-wave pairing symmetry in symmetry class DDD. We analyze the topological phase transitions by applying three different methods which include a disorder averaged entanglement entropy, a disorder averaged real-space Chern number, and an evaluation of the momentum space Chern number in a disorder averaged effective model. We find evidence for a disorder-induced topological state. While in the clean limit there is a single phase transition from a trivial phase with a Chern number C=4C=4C=4 to a topological phase with C=1C=1C=1, in the disordered system there is an intermediate phase with C=3C=3C=3. The phase transition from the trivial C=4C=4C=4 phase into the intermediate phase with C=3C=3C=3 is seen in the real-space calculation of the Chern number. In spite of this, this phase transition is not detectable in the entanglement entropy. A second phase transition from the disorder induced C=3C=3C=3 into the C=1C=1C=1 phase is seen in all three quantities.
Entanglement entropy (EE) provides a powerful probe of quantum phases, yet its role in identifying topological phase transitions in disordered systems remains underexplored. We introduce an exact EE-based framework that captures topological phase transitions even in the presence of disorder. Specifically, for a class of Su-Schrieffer-Heeger (SSH) model variants, we show that the difference in EE between half-filled and near-half-filled ground states,ΔSA, vanishes in the topological phase but remains finite in the trivial phase, a direct consequence of edge-state localization. This behavior persists even in the presence of quasiperiodic or binary disorder. By analyzing domain-wall configurations in the SSH chain, we further show how subsystem tuning allows one to distinguish genuine topological zero-energy eigenstates from trivial localized states. Exact phase boundaries, derived from Lyapunov exponents via transfer matrices, agree closely with numerical results fromΔSAand the topological invariant𝓠, with instances whereΔSAoutperforms𝓠. Our results highlight EE as a robust diagnostic tool and a potential bridge between quantum information and condensed matter approaches to topological matter.