Edge modes in the Hofstadter model of interacting electrons

Abstract

We provide a detailed analysis of a realization of chiral gapless edge modes in the framework of the Hofstadter model of interacting electrons. In a transverse homogeneous magnetic field and a rational magnetic flux through an unit cell the fermion spectrum splits into topological subbands with well-defined Chern numbers, contains gapless edge modes in the gaps. It is shown that the behavior of gapless edge modes is described within the framework of the Kitaev chain where the tunneling of Majorana fermions is determined by effective hopping of Majorana fermions between chains. The proposed approach makes it possible to study the fermion spectrum in the case of an irrational flux, to calculate the Hall conductance of subbands that form a fine structure of the spectrum. In the case of a rational flux and a strong on-site Hubbard interaction $U$, $U>4\Delta$ ($\Delta$ is a gap), the topological state of the system, which is determined by the corresponding Chern number and chiral gapless edge modes, collapses. When the magnitude of the on-site Hubbard interaction changes, at the point $U=4\Delta$ a topological phase transition is realized, i.e., there are changes in the Chern numbers of two subbands due to their degeneration.

7 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (5)

• Classification of topological insulators and superconductors in three spatial dimensions
• Interaction Effects in Topological Superconducting Wires Supporting Majorana Fermions
• Majorana edge states in interacting one-dimensional systems
• A Fractionalized Quantum Spin Hall Effect
• The Colored Hofstadter Butterfly for the Honeycomb Lattice

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Stability of zero energy Dirac touchings in the honeycomb Hofstadter problem
• Topological states in the Hofstadter model on a honeycomb lattice
• Exactly solvable chain of interacting electrons with correlated hopping and pairing
• The quantum Hall effect at a weak magnetic field
• Topological Mott transition in a two band model of spinless fermions with on-site Coulomb repulsion