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arXiv:1910.09474 · Physical review. B./Physical review. B

Effects of anisotropic correlations in fermionic zero-energy bound states of topological phases

M. A. R. Griffith, E. Mamani, Lizardo H.C.M. Nunes, Heron Caldas

Published May 15, 2020• 4 citations
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Abstract

Topological phases of matter have been used as a fertile realm of intensive discussions about fermionic fractionalization. In this work, we study the effects of anisotropic superconducting correlations in the fermionic fractionalization on the topological phases. We consider a hybrid version of the SSH and Kitaev models with an anisotropic superconducting order parameter to investigate the unusual states with zero energy that emerges in a finite chain. To obtain these zero-energy solutions, we built a chain with a well-defined domain wall at the middle of the chain. Our solutions indicate an interesting dynamic between the zero-energy state around the domain wall and the superconducting correlation parameters. Finally, we find that the presence of an isolated Majorana at the ends of the chain is strongly dependent on the existence of the solitonic excitation in the middle of the chain.

DOI
10.1103/physrevb.101.184514

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Topological phases of matter have been used as a fertile realm of intensive discussions about fermionic fractionalization. In this work, we study the effects of anisotropic superconducting correlations in the fermionic fractionalization on the topological phases. We consider a hybrid version of the SSH and Kitaev models with an anisotropic superconducting order parameter to investigate the unusual states with zero energy that emerges in a finite chain. To obtain these zero-energy solutions, we built a chain with a well-defined domain wall at the middle of the chain. Our solutions indicate an interesting dynamic between the zero-energy state around the domain wall and the superconducting correlation parameters. Finally, we find that the presence of an isolated Majorana at the ends of the chain is strongly dependent on the existence of the solitonic excitation in the middle of the chain.
Zero energy states in one dimensional SSH Kitaev hybrid systems have emerged as promising candidates for topological qubits. In our work, we show that introducing a domain wall into a chain with anisotropic superconducting correlations provides a powerful way to control both the number and the nature of these boundary modes. The defect acts as a digital knob: its presence or absence flips the parity of zero modes and thus decides whether an isolated Majorana exists at the chain ends. This on/off mechanism is significantly more robust and simpler than fine-tuning global parameters such as chemical potential or hopping amplitudes. Moreover, anisotropy provides an additional lever to calibrate the effect of the defect, opening a pathway to architectures where topological qubits can be locally addressed by domain walls. This proposal reframes defects not as imperfections, but as useful resources for quantum information and computation.
This thesis is devoted to the topic of one- and two-dimensional models of topological superconductivity. We study the Kitaev chain subject to closed and open boundary conditions. In the closed chain, we derive the energy spectrum, the ground state, and the topological invariant viewed as a certain Berry phase. We study two-point correlation functions and find enlarged values close to the topological phase transitions. The open chain is studied with focus on describing the degenerate ground states for a simple parameter choice in the topological phase. Then, the open system Hamiltonian is diagonalized numerically, and we model the order parameter with a spatial dependency. Additional Majorana zero modes appear if the order parameter changes sign. We also consider the p+ip model. The localization of a Majorana zero mode, bound to a vortex that is described by Ginzburg-Landau theory, is found numerically. We propose an argument that results in a non-Abelian exchange transformation for a system of several vortices. The p+ip model is also studied on an annulus; we approximate the ground state as a combination of boundary states and calculate its energy. The results are compared to a numerical implementation, and the agreement is convincing as the boundary separation becomes large compared to other length scales.
We consider one-dimensional topological insulators hosting fractionally charged midgap states in the presence and absence of induced superconductivity pairing. Under the protection of a discrete symmetry, relating positive and negative energy states, the solitonic midgap states remain pinned at zero energy when superconducting correlations are induced by proximity effect. When the superconducting pairing dominates the initial insulating gap, Majorana fermion phases develop for a class of insulators. As a concrete example, we study the Creutz model with induced sss-wave superconductivity and repulsive Hubbard-type interactions. For a finite wire, without interactions, the solitonic modes originating from the nonsuperconducting model survive at zero energy, revealing a fourfold-degenerate ground state. However, interactions break the aforementioned discrete symmetry and completely remove this degeneracy, thereby producing a unique ground state which is characterized by a topological bulk invariant with respect to the product of fermion parity and bond inversion. In contrast, the Majorana edge modes are globally robust to interactions. Moreover, the parameter range for which a topological Majorana phase is stabilized expands when increasing the repulsive Hubbard interaction. The topological phase diagram of the interacting model is obtained using a combination of mean-field theory and density matrix renormalization group techniques.
The Kitaev honeycomb model has attracted significant interest due to its quantum spin liquid ground state, fractionalized Majorana excitations, and topological properties. Motivated by these features, we introduce a quasi-one-dimensional Kitaev-like spin chain derived from a truncated honeycomb geometry. The resulting Majorana band structure contains both dispersive and flat bands, with a gap closing at a critical anisotropy that separates trivial and chiral topological phases. Under open boundary conditions, the topological regime hosts zero-energy edge modes protected by chiral symmetry, placing the system in the BDI symmetry class with a quantized winding number. In the excited spectrum, localized plaquette modes emerge near zero energy and can be tuned by introducing domains of negative plaquettes. The dynamical spin correlation function reveals broad continua associated with fractionalized excitations, together with characteristic low-energy spectral weight from edge Majorana modes. These features distinguish the present system from conventional Heisenberg spin chains and provide experimentally relevant fingerprints of chiral topological order. Our model thus establishes a conceptual bridge between the two-dimensional Kitaev spin liquid and Kitaev's one-dimensional quantum wire.
We find the coexistence of two kinds of fractionalized modes, Majorana modes at the geometric ends and Jackiw–Rebbi-type bound state (JRBS) at a domain-wall, in a new topological superconducting phase in one-dimensional (1D) systems. Each localized JRBS carries a new fractional quantity, half of the parity of the fermion number. This induces a topological protected crossing at the zero energy for its eigenenergy. For a chain embedded with a JRBS, it is possible to switch between the occupied and the empty states of the Majorana zero energy state (MZES) by varying the strength of the external magnetic field across that crossing point. This enables a way to encode a quantum qubit into one MZES without breaking parity conservation. We propose that such JRBS and Majorana fermions may appear in two 1D models. One may be implemented in an artificial lattice with staggered hopping, staggered spin-orbital interaction and staggered superconducting pairing in cold fermion atoms. The other is a 1D semiconductor chain sandwiched between s-wave superconductor and antiferromagnet.
Topological phases of matter that depend for their existence on interactions are fundamentally interesting and potentially useful as platforms for future quantum computers. Despite the multitude of theoretical proposals, the only interaction-enabled topological phase experimentally observed is the fractional quantum Hall liquid. To help identify other systems that can give rise to such phases, we present in this work a detailed study of the effect of interactions on Majorana zero modes bound to vortices in a superconducting surface of a three-dimensional topological insulator. This system is of interest because, as was recently pointed out, it can be tuned into the regime of strong interactions. We start with a zero-dimensional system suggesting an experimental realization of the interaction-induced Z8{\mathbb{Z}}_{8}Z8​ ground-state periodicity previously discussed by Fidkowski and Kitaev [Phys. Rev. B 81, 134509 (2010); Phys. Rev. B 83, 075103 (2011)] . We argue that the periodicity is experimentally observable using a tunnel probe. We then focus on interaction-enabled crystalline topological phases that can be built with the Majoranas in a vortex lattice in higher dimensions. In one dimension, we identify an interesting exactly solvable model which is related to a previously discussed one that exhibits an interaction-enabled topological phase. We study these models using analytical techniques, exact numerical diagonalization, and density matrix renormalization group. Our results confirm the existence of the interaction-enabled topological phase and clarify the nature of the quantum phase transition that leads to it. We finish with a discussion of models in dimensions 2 and 3 that produce similar interaction-enabled topological phases.