No Arabic abstract
Over the last 100 years, the group-theoretic characterization of crystalline solids has provided the foundational language for diverse problems in physics and chemistry. There exist two classes of crystalline solids: nonmagnetic crystals left invariant by space groups (SGs), and solids with commensurate magnetic order that respect the symmetries of magnetic space groups (MSGs). Whereas many of the properties of the SGs, such as their momentum-space corepresentations (coreps) and elementary band coreps (EBRs) were tabulated with relative ease, progress on deriving the analogous properties of the MSGs has largely stalled for the past 70 years due to the complicated symmetries of magnetic crystals. In this work, we complete the 100-year-old problem of crystalline group theory by deriving the small coreps, momentum stars, compatibility relations, and magnetic EBRs (MEBRs) of the single (spinless) and double (spinful) MSGs. We have implemented freely-accessible tools on the Bilbao Crystallographic Server for accessing the coreps of the MSGs, whose wide-ranging applications include neutron diffraction investigations of magnetic structure, the interplay of lattice regularization and (symmetry-enhanced) fermion doubling, and magnetic topological phases, such as axion insulators and spin liquids. Using the MEBRs, we extend the earlier theory of Topological Quantum Chemistry to the MSGs to form a complete, real-space theory of band topology in magnetic and nonmagnetic crystalline solids - Magnetic Topological Quantum Chemistry (MTQC). We then use MTQC to derive the complete set of symmetry-based indicators (SIs) of band topology in all spinful (fermionic) crystals, for which we identify symmetry-respecting bulk and anomalous surface and hinge states. Lastly, using the SIs, we discover several novel non-axionic magnetic higher-order topological insulators.
The past decades apparent success in predicting and experimentally discovering distinct classes of topological insulators (TIs) and semimetals masks a fundamental shortcoming: out of 200,000 stoichiometric compounds extant in material databases, only several hundred of them are topologically nontrivial. Are TIs that esoteric, or does this reflect a fundamental problem with the current piecemeal approach to finding them? To address this, we propose a new and complete electronic band theory that highlights the link between topology and local chemical bonding, and combines this with the conventional band theory of electrons. Topological Quantum Chemistry is a description of the universal global properties of all possible band structures and materials, comprised of a graph theoretical description of momentum space and a dual group theoretical description in real space. We classify the possible band structures for all 230 crystal symmetry groups that arise from local atomic orbitals, and show which are topologically nontrivial. We show how our topological band theory sheds new light on known TIs, and demonstrate the power of our method to predict a plethora of new TIs.
The link between chemical orbitals described by local degrees of freedom and band theory, which is defined in momentum space, was proposed by Zak several decades ago for spinless systems with and without time-reversal in his theory of elementary band representations. In Nature 547, 298-305 (2017), we introduced the generalization of this theory to the experimentally relevant situation of spin-orbit coupled systems with time-reversal symmetry and proved that all bands that do not transform as band representations are topological. Here, we give the full details of this construction. We prove that elementary band representations are either connected as bands in the Brillouin zone and are described by localized Wannier orbitals respecting the symmetries of the lattice (including time-reversal when applicable), or, if disconnected, describe topological insulators. We then show how to generate a band representation from a particular Wyckoff position and determine which Wyckoff positions generate elementary band representations for all space groups. This theory applies to spinful and spinless systems, in all dimensions, with and without time reversal. We introduce a homotopic notion of equivalence and show that it results in a finer classification of topological phases than approaches based only on the symmetry of wavefunctions at special points in the Brillouin zone. Utilizing a mapping of the band connectivity into a graph theory problem, which we introduced in Nature 547, 298-305 (2017), we show in companion papers which Wyckoff positions can generate disconnected elementary band representations, furnishing a natural avenue for a systematic materials search.
In a topological quantum computer, braids of non-Abelian anyons in a (2+1)-dimensional space-time form quantum gates, whose fault tolerance relies on the topological, rather than geometric, properties of the braids. Here we propose to create and exploit redundant geometric degrees of freedom to improve the theoretical accuracy of topological single- and two-qubit quantum gates. We demonstrate the power of the idea using explicit constructions in the Fibonacci model. We compare its efficiency with that of the Solovay-Kitaev algorithm and explain its connection to the leakage errors reduction in an earlier construction [Phys. Rev. A 78, 042325 (2008)].
Exotic phases of matter emerge from the interplay between strong electron interactions and non-trivial topology. Owing to their lack of dispersion at the single-particle level, systems harboring flat bands are excellent testbeds for strongly interacting physics, with twisted bilayer graphene serving as a prime example. On the other hand, existing theoretical models for obtaining flat bands in crystalline materials, such as the line-graph formalism, are often too restrictive for real-life material realizations. Here we present a generic technique for constructing perfectly flat bands from bipartite crystalline lattices. Our prescription encapsulates and generalizes the various flat band models in the literature, being applicable to systems with any orbital content, with or without spin-orbit coupling. Using Topological Quantum Chemistry, we build a complete topological classification in terms of symmetry eigenvalues of all the gapped and gapless flat bands, for all 1651 Magnetic Space Groups. In addition, we derive criteria for the existence of symmetry-protected band touching points between the flat and dispersive bands, and we identify the gapped flat bands as prime candidates for fragile topological phases. Finally, we show that the set of all (gapped and gapless) perfectly flat bands is finitely generated and construct the corresponding bases for all 1651 Shubnikov Space Groups.
We propose an exact model of anyon ground states including higher Landau levels, and use it to obtain fractionally quantized Hall states at filling fractions $ u=p/(p(m-1)+1)$ with $m$ odd, from integer Hall states at $ u=p$ through adiabatic localization of magnetic flux. For appropriately chosen two-body potential interactions, the energy gap remains intact during the process. The construction hence establishes the existence of incompressible states at these fillings.