No Arabic abstract
In this paper we present a complete and exact spectral analysis of the $(1+1)$-dimensional model that Jackiw and Rebbi considered to show that the half-integral fermion numbers are possible due to the presence of an isolated self charge conjugate zero mode. The model possesses the charge and particle conjugation symmetries. These symmetries mandate the reflection symmetry of the spectrum about the line $E=0$. We obtain the bound state energies and wave functions of the fermion in this model using two different methods, analytically and exactly, for every arbitrary choice of the parameters of the kink, i.e. its value at spatial infinity ($theta_0$) and its scale of variations ($mu$). Then, we plot the bound state energies of the fermion as a function of $theta_0$. This graph enables us to consider a process of building up the kink from the trivial vacuum. We can then determine the origin and evolution of the bound state energy levels during this process. We see that the model has a dynamical mass generation process at the first quantized level and the zero-energy fermionic mode responsible for the fractional fermion number, is always present during the construction of the kink and its origin is very peculiar, indeed. We also observe that, as expected, none of the energy levels crosses each other. Moreover, we obtain analytically the continuum scattering wave functions of the fermion and then calculate the phase shifts of these wave functions. Using the information contained in the graphs of the phase shifts and the bound states, we show that our phase shifts are consistent with the weak and strong forms of the Levinson theorem. Finally, using the weak form of the Levinson theorem, we confirm that the number of the zero-energy fermionic modes is exactly one.
In this paper we analyze a generalized Jackiw-Rebbi (J-R) model in which a massive fermion is coupled to the kink of the $lambdaphi^4$ model as a prescribed background field. We solve this massive J-R model exactly and analytically and obtain the whole spectrum of the fermion, including the bound and continuum states. The mass term of the fermion makes the potential of the decoupled second order Schrodinger-like equations asymmetric in a way that their asymptotic values at two spatial infinities are different. Therefore, we encounter the unusual problem in which two kinds of continuum states are possible for the fermion: reflecting and scattering states. We then show the energies of all the states as a function of the parameters of the kink, i.e. its value at spatial infinity ($theta_0$) and its slope at $x=0$ ($mu$). The graph of the energies as a function of $theta_0$, where the bound state energies and the two kinds of continuum states are depicted, shows peculiar features including an energy gap in the form of a triangle where no bound states exist. That is the zero mode exists only for $theta_0$ larger than a critical value $(theta_0^{textrm{c}})$. This is in sharp contrast to the usual (massless) J-R model where the zero mode and hence the fermion number $pm1/2$ for the ground state is ever present. This also makes the origin of the zero mode very clear: It is formed from the union of the two threshold bound states at $theta_0^{textrm{c}}$, which is zero in the massless J-R model.
We theoretically investigate the emergence of Jackiw-Rebbi zero modes and their conductance signature in non-uniform topological insulator nano-wires. We modelled the non-uniform nano-wires as junction between two cylindrical nano-wires with different radius. In the limit of wire length being much larger than its radius, the surface state of the nanowire splits into one dimensional Dirac modes propagating along the axis of the cylinder owing to radial confinement. The sign of the mass gap in each of these Dirac mode is decided by angular momentum quantum number corresponding to the rotational motion of the electron about the axis of the cylindrical. Application of an external magnetic flux through the cylindrical nanowires enables us to tune the mass gap from positive to negative value across the junction. Due to this flux tunable band inversion, controlled by the external magnetic filed, Jackiw-Rebbi zero modes can be made to appear or disappear at the junction. We compute differential conductance of our topological insulator nanowire junction and show that a quantized conductance peak appears at zero-energy (zero-bias) in the presence of the Jackiw-Rebbi mode.
It is important to obtain (nearly) massless localized modes for the low-energy four-dimensional effective field theory in the brane-world scenario. We propose a mechanism for bosonic zero modes using the field-dependent kinetic function in the classical field theory set-up. As a particularly simple case, we consider a domain wall in five dimensions, and show that massless states for scalar (0-form), vector (1-form), and tensor (2-form) fields appear on a domain wall, which may be called topological because of robustness of their existence (insensitive to continuous deformations of parameters). The spin of localized massless bosons is selected by the shape of the nonlinear kinetic function, analogously to the chirality selection of fermion by the well-known Jackiw-Rebbi mechanism. Several explicitly solvable examples are given. We consider not only (anti)BPS domain walls in non-compact extra dimension but also non-BPS domain walls in compact extra dimension.
We study the scalar perturbation sector of the general axisymmetric warped Salam-Sezgin model with codimension-2 branes. We focus on the perturbations which mix with the dilaton. We show that the scalar fluctuations analysis can be reduced to studying two scalar modes of constant wavefunction, plus modes of non-constant wavefunction which obey a single Schroedinger equation. From the obtained explicit solution of the scalar modes, we point out the importance of the non-constant modes in describing the four dimensional effective theory. This observation remains true for the unwarped case and was neglected in the relevant literature. Furthermore, we show that the warped solutions are free of instabilities.
Electric and magnetic resonances of dielectric particles have recently uncovered a range of exciting applications in steering of light at the nanoscale. Breaking of particle inversion symmetry further modifies its electromagnetic response giving rise to bianisotropy known also as magneto-electric coupling. Recent studies suggest the crucial role of magneto-electric coupling in realization of photonic topological metamaterials. To further unmask this fundamental link, we design and test experimentally one-dimensional array composed of dielectric particles with overlapping electric and magnetic resonances and broken mirror symmetry. Flipping over half of the meta-atoms in the array, we observe the emergence of interface states providing photonic realization of the celebrated Jackiw-Rebbi model. We trace the origin of these states to the fact that local modification of particle bianisotropic response affects its effective coupling with the neighboring meta-atoms which provides a promising avenue to engineer topological states of light.