From topological insulators to superconductors and Confinement

Abstract

Topological matter in 3D is characterized by the presence of a topological BF term in its long-distance effective action. We show that, in 3D, there is another marginal term that must be added to the action in order to fully determine the physical content of the model. The quantum phase structure is governed by three parameters that drive the condensation of topological defects: the BF coupling, the electric permittivity and the magnetic permeability of the material. For intermediate levels of electric permittivity and magnetic permeability the material is a topological insulator. We predict, however, new states of matter when these parameters cross critical values: a topological superconductor when electric permittivity is increased and magnetic permeability is lowered and a charge confinement phase in the opposite case of low electric permittivity and high magnetic permeability. Synthetic topological matter may be fabricated as 3D arrays of Josephson junctions.

5 pages, no figures, few references added, typos corrected and few comments added

References in corpus (1)

• Charge Spin Separation in 3D

Cited by in corpus (10)

• Electron-hole pairing in topological insulator thin film
• Topological order in a correlated three-dimensional topological insulator
• (3+1)-dimensional topological quantum field theory from a tight-binding model of interacting spinless fermions
• Higgsless superconductivity from topological defects in compact BF terms
• Low coverage surface diffusion in complex energy landscapes: Analytical solution and application to intercalation in topological insulators
• 4D Topological Mass by Gauging Spin
• 't Hooft surface in lattice gauge theory
• The Universe as a Set of Topological Fluids with Hierarchy and Fine Tuning of Coupling Constants in Terms of Graph Manifolds
• Quark-Gluon Plasma and Topological Quantum Fields Theory
• Emergent Higgsless Superconductivity