Structural-Disorder-Induced Second-Order Topological Insulators in Three Dimensions

Higher-order topological insulators arc established as topological crystalline insulators protected by crystalline symmetries. One celebrated example is the second-order topological insulator in three dimensions that hosts chiral hinge modes protected by crystalline symmetries. Since amorphous solids are ubiquitous, it is important to ask whether such a second-order topological insulator can exist in an amorphous system without any spatial order. Here, we predict the existence of a second-order topological insulating phase in an amorphous system without any crystalline symmetry. Such a topological phase manifests in the winding number of the quadrupole moment, the quantized longitudinal conductance, and the hinge states. Furthermore, in stark contrast to the viewpoint that structural disorder should be detrimental to the higher-order topological phase, we remarkably find that structural disorder can induce a second-order topological insulator from a topologically trivial phase in a regular geometry. We finally demonstrate the existence of a second-order topological phase in amorphous systems with time-reversal symmetry.

Automated summary

Researchers predict a second-order topological insulating phase in amorphous systems without any crystalline symmetry, and find that structural disorder can induce this higher-order topological phase.