The presence or absence of certain symmetries in the normal state (NS) also determines the symmetry of the Cooper pairs. Here we show that parity (${\mathcal P}$) and time-reversal (${\mathcal T}$) odd Dirac insulators (trivial or topological) or metals, sustain a local or intra-unit cell pairing that supports corner (in $d=2$) or hinge (in $d=3$) modes of Majorana fermions and stands as a higher-order topological superconductor (HOTSC), when the NS additionally breaks discrete four-fold ($C_4$) symmetry. Although these outcomes does not rely on the existence of a Fermi surface, around it (when the system is doped) the HOTSC takes the form of a mixed parity, ${\mathcal T}$-odd (due to the lack of ${\mathcal P}$ and ${\mathcal T}$ in the NS, respectively) $p+id$ pairing, where the $p$($d$)-wave component stems from the Dirac nature of quasiparticles (lack of $C_4$ symmetry) in the NS. Thus, when strained, magnetically ordered Dirac materials, such as doped magnetic topological insulators (MnBi$_2$Te$_4$), can harbor HOTSCs, while the absence of an external strain should be conducive for the axionic $p+is$ pairing.
In this work we predict several new types of topological semimetals that exhibit a bulk quadrupole moment. These semimetals are modeled with a 3D extension of the 2D quadrupole topological insulator. One type of semimetal has bulk nodes and gapped, topological surfaces. A second type, which we may call a higher order topological semimetal, has a gapped bulk, but harbors a Dirac semimetal with an even number of nodes on one or more surfaces. The final type has a gapped bulk, but harbors half of a Dirac semimetal on multiple surfaces. Each of these semimetals gives rise to mid-gap hinge states a…
Working in the crystal-momentum representation, we calculate the optical conductivity of noncentrosymmetric insulating crystals at first order in the wave vector of light. The time-even part of this tensor describes natural optical activity and the time-odd part describes nonreciprocal effects such as gyrotropic birefringence. The time-odd part can be uniquely decomposed into magnetoelectriclike and purely quadrupolar contributions. The magnetoelectriclike component reduces in the static limit to the traceless part of the frozen-ion static magnetoelectric polarizability while at finite frequen…
The low energy quasiparticle dispersion of various narrow gap and gapless semiconductors are respectively described by three dimensional massive and massless Dirac fermions. The three dimensional Dirac spinor structure admits a time-reversal invariant, odd parity and Lorentz pseudoscalar topological superconducting state. Here we derive the effective field theory of this topological paired state for massless Dirac fermions in the presence of a fluctuating Zeeman term, which appears as a chiral gauge field. The effective theory consists of a mixed electromagnetic and chiral anomaly term in the …
We investigate parity-odd non-dissipative transport in an anisotropic Dirac semi-metal in two spatial dimensions. The analysis is relevant for interacting electronic systems with merging Dirac points at charge neutrality. For such systems the dispersion relation is relativistic in one direction and non-relativistic in the other. We give a proposal how to calculate the Berry curvature for this system and use it to derive more than one odd viscosities, in contrast to rotationally invariant systems. We observe that in such a model the odd part of stress tensor is parameterised by two independent …
We identify three-dimensional higher-order superconductors characterized by the coexistence of one-dimensional Majorana hinge states and gapless surface sates. We show how such superconductors can be obtained starting from the model of a spinful quadrupolar semimetal with two orbitals and adding an s-wave superconducting pairing term. By considering all the possible s-wave pairings satisfying Fermi-Dirac statistics we obtain six different superconducting models. We find that for two of these models a flat-band of hinge Majorana states coexist with surface states, and that these models have a n…
We introduce the concept of 3D Dirac (Weyl) superconductors (SC), which have protected bulk four(two)-fold nodal points and surface Andreev arcs at zero energy. We provide a sufficient criterion for realizing them in centrosymmetric SCs with odd-parity pairing and mirror symmetry, e.g., the nodal phases of Cu$_x$Bi$_2$Se$_3$. Pairs of Dirac nodes appear in a mirror-invariant plane when the mirror winding number is nontrivial. Breaking mirror symmetry may gap Dirac nodes producing a topological SC. Each Dirac node evolves to a nodal ring when inversion-gauge symmetry is broken. A Dirac node may…
Nonunitary superconductivity has attracted renewed interest as a novel gapless phase of matter. In this study, we investigate the superconducting gap structure of nonunitary odd-parity chiral pairing states in a superconductor involving strong spin-orbit interactions. By applying a group theoretical classification of chiral states in terms of discrete rotation symmetry, we categorized all possible point-nodal gap structures in nonunitary chiral states into four types in terms of the topological number of nodes and node positions relative to the rotation axis. In addition to conventional Dirac …
The spectrum of massless Dirac electrons on the side surface of a three-dimensional weak topological insulator is significantly affected by whether the number of unit atomic layers constituting the sample is even or odd; it has a finite-size energy gap in the even case while it is gapless in the odd case. The conductivity of such a two-dimensional Dirac electron system with quenched disorder is calculated when the Fermi level is located at the Dirac point. It is shown that the conductivity increases with increasing disorder and shows no clear even-odd difference when the aspect ratio of the sy…
We study the effect of the Fermi surface anisotropy on the odd-frequency spin-triplet pairing component of the induced pair potential. We consider a superconductor/ ferromagnetic insulator (S/FI) hybrid structure formed on the 3D topological insulator (TI) surface. In this case three ingredients insure the possibility of the odd-frequency pairing: 1) the topological surface states, 2) the induced pair potential, and 3) the magnetic moment of a nearby ferromagnetic insulator. We take into account the strong anisotropy of the Dirac cone in topological insulators when the chemical potential lies …
The Landau bands of mirror symmetric 2D Dirac semi-metals (for example odd-layers of ABA-graphene) can be identified by their parity with respect to mirror symmetry. This symmetry facilitates a new class of counter-propagating Hall states at opposite but equal electron and hole filling factors $|ν_{\pm}|=1/m$ ({\it m} odd). Here, we propose a Laughlin-like correlated liquid wavefunction, at the charge neutrality point, that exhibits fractionally charged quasi-particle/hole pair excitation of opposite parity. Using a bosonized one-dimensional edge state theory, we show that the longitudinal con…
We discuss a non-fermi liquid gapless metallic surface state of the topological band insulator. It has an odd number of gapless Dirac fermions coupled to a non-compact U(1) gauge field. This can be viewed as a vortex dual to the conventional Dirac fermion surface state. This surface duality is a reflection of a bulk dual description discussed recently for the gauged topological insulator. All the other known surface states can be conveniently accessed from the dual Dirac liquid, including the surface quantum hall state, the Fu-Kane superconductor, the gapped symmetric topological order and the…
Odd numbers of Dirac points and helical states can exist at edges (surfaces) of two-dimensional (three-dimensional) topological insulators. In the bulk of a one-dimensional lattice (not an edge) with time reversal symmetry, however, a no-go theorem forbids the existence of an odd number of Dirac points or helical states. Introducing a magnetic field can violate the time reversal condition but would usually lift the degeneracy at the Dirac points. We find that a spatially periodic magnetic field with zero mean value can induce a single Dirac point in a one-dimensional system with spin-orbit cou…
We use the DMRG to study the correlated electron states favored by the Coulomb interaction projected onto the narrow bands of twisted bilayer graphene within a spinless one-valley model. The Hilbert space of the narrow bands is constructed from a pair of hybrid Wannier states with opposite Chern numbers. Depending on the parameters in the BM model, the DMRG in this basis determines the ground state at one particle per unit cell to be either QAH state or a state with no Hall effect which is nearly a product state. Based on this form, we then apply the variational method to study their competiti…
The quest for new realizations of higher-order topological system has garnered much recent attention. In this work, we propose a paradigmatic brick lattice model where corner modes requires protection by nonsymmorphic symmetry in addition to two commuting mirror symmetries. Unlike the well-known square corner mode lattice, it has an odd number of occupied bands, which necessitates a different definition for the $\mathbb Z_2\times \mathbb Z_2$ topological invariant. By studying both the quadrupolar polarization and effective edge model, our study culminates in a phase diagram containing two dis…
The quantum Hall effect in graphene is regarded to be involving half-integer topological numbers associated with the massless Dirac particle, this is usually not apparent due to the doubling of the Dirac cones. Here we theoretically consider two classes of lattice models in which we manipulate the Dirac cones with either (a) two Dirac points that have mutually different energies, or (b) multiple Dirac cones having different Fermi velocities. We have shown, with an explicit calculation of the topological (Chern) number for case (a) and with an adiabatic argument for case (b) that the results ar…
While the quantum Hall effect in graphene has been regarded as a realization of the anomaly associated with the massless Dirac particle carrying half the usual topological integer, this is hidden due to the doubling of the Dirac cones. In order to confirm the half-integer contribution from each Dirac cone, here we theoretically consider a lattice model in which the relative energy between the two Dirac points is systematically shifted. With an explicit calculation of the topological (Chern) number, we have demonstrated that each Dirac cone does indeed contribute to the Hall conductivity as the…
We have designed three-dimensional models of topological insulator thin films, showing a tunability of the odd number of Dirac cones on opposite surfaces driven by the atomic-scale geometry at the boundaries. This enables creation of a single Dirac cone at the $Γ$-point as well as possible suppression of quantum tunneling between Dirac states at opposite surfaces (and gap formation), when opposite surfaces are geometrically differentiated. The spin texture of surface states was found to change from a spin-momentum-locking symmetry to a progressive loss in surface spin polarization upon the int…
We study the response of a class of topological systems to electromagnetic and gravitational sources, including torsion and curvature. By using the technology of anomaly polynomials, we derive the parity-odd response of a massive Dirac fermion in $d=2+1$ and $d=4+1$, which provides a simple model for a topological insulator. We discuss the covariant anomalies of the corresponding edge states, from a Callan-Harvey anomaly-inflow, as well as a Hamiltonian spectral flow point of view. We also discuss the applicability of our results to other systems such as Weyl semi-metals. Finally, using dimens…
