Topologically Protected Extended States in Disordered Quantum Spin-Hall Systems without Time-Reversal Symmetry

Abstract

We demonstrate the existence of robust bulk extended states in the disordered Kane-Mele model with vertical and horizontal Zeeman fields, in the presence of a large Rashba coupling. The phase diagrams are mapped out by using level statistics analysis and computations of the localization length and spin-Chern numbers $C_{\pm }$. $C_{\pm }$ are protected by the finite energy and spin mobility gaps. The latter is shown to stay open for arbitrarily large vertical Zeeman fields, or for horizontal Zeeman fields below a critical strength or at moderate disorder. In such cases, a change of $C_{\pm }$ is necessarily accompanied by the closing of the mobility gap at the Fermi level. The numerical simulations reveal sharp changes in the quantized values of $C_{\pm }$ when crossing the regions of bulk extended states, indicating that the topological nature of the extended states is indeed linked to the spin-Chern numbers. For large horizontal Zeeman fields, the spin-gap closes at strong disorder prompting a change in the quantized spin-Chern numbers without a closing of the energy mobility gap.

5 pages, 6 figures