Journal
PHYSICAL REVIEW A
Volume 83, Issue 2, Pages -Publisher
AMER PHYSICAL SOC
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.83.023609
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Funding
- Excellence Initiative of the German Federal and State Governments
- F.R.S-F.N.R.S (Belgium)
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Physical phenomena driven by topological properties, such as the quantum Hall effect, have the appealing feature that they are robust with respect to external perturbations. Lately, a new class of materials has emerged that manifests topological properties at room temperature and without the need of external magnetic fields. These topological insulators are band insulators with large spin-orbit interactions and exhibit the quantum spin-Hall (QSH) effect. Here we investigate the transition between QSH and normal insulating phases under topological deformations of a two-dimensional lattice. We demonstrate that the QSH phase present in the honeycomb lattice loses its robustness as the occupancy of extra lattice sites is allowed. Furthermore, we propose a method for verifying our predictions with fermionic cold atoms in optical lattices. In this context, the spin-orbit interaction is engineered via an appropriate synthetic gauge field.
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