Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
Phys Rev Lett. 2012 Aug 31;109(9):096403. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.109.096403. Epub 2012 Aug 27.
In free fermion systems with given symmetry and dimension, the possible topological phases are labeled by elements of only three types of Abelian groups, 0, Z2, or Z. For example, noninteracting one-dimensional fermionic superconducting phases with S(z) spin rotation and time-reversal symmetries are classified by Z. We show that with weak interactions, this classification reduces to Z4. Using group cohomology, one can additionally show that there are only four distinct phases for such one-dimensional superconductors even with strong interactions. Comparing their projective representations, we find that all these four symmetry-protected topological phases can be realized with free fermions. Further, we show that one-dimensional fermionic superconducting phases with Z(n) discrete S(z) spin rotation and time-reversal symmetries are classified by Z4 when n is even and Z2 when n is odd; again, all these strongly interacting topological phases can be realized by noninteracting fermions. Our approach can be applied to systems with other symmetries to see which one-dimensional topological phases can be realized with free fermions.
在具有给定对称性和维度的自由费米子系统中,可能的拓扑相由仅三种类型的阿贝尔群的元素标记,0、Z2 或 Z。例如,具有 S(z)自旋旋转和时间反演对称性的非相互作用一维费米子超导相由 Z 分类。我们表明,在弱相互作用下,这种分类减少到 Z4。使用群上同调,人们还可以表明,即使存在强相互作用,这种一维超导体也只有四个不同的相。通过比较它们的射影表示,我们发现所有这四个受保护拓扑相都可以用自由费米子来实现。此外,我们表明,具有 Z(n)离散 S(z)自旋旋转和时间反演对称性的一维费米子超导相在 n 为偶数时由 Z4 分类,在 n 为奇数时由 Z2 分类;同样,所有这些强相互作用的拓扑相都可以通过非相互作用的费米子来实现。我们的方法可以应用于具有其他对称性的系统,以了解哪些一维拓扑相可以用自由费米子来实现。