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Topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-Hermitian physics
Topological phases are enriched in non-equilibrium open systems effectively described by non-Hermitian Hamiltonians. While several properties unique to non-Hermitian topological systems were uncovered, the fundamental role of symmetry in non-Hermitian physics has yet to be fully understood, and it h...
Autores principales: | , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Nature Publishing Group UK
2019
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6336874/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30655542 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-08254-y |
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author | Kawabata, Kohei Higashikawa, Sho Gong, Zongping Ashida, Yuto Ueda, Masahito |
author_facet | Kawabata, Kohei Higashikawa, Sho Gong, Zongping Ashida, Yuto Ueda, Masahito |
author_sort | Kawabata, Kohei |
collection | PubMed |
description | Topological phases are enriched in non-equilibrium open systems effectively described by non-Hermitian Hamiltonians. While several properties unique to non-Hermitian topological systems were uncovered, the fundamental role of symmetry in non-Hermitian physics has yet to be fully understood, and it has remained unclear how symmetry protects non-Hermitian topological phases. Here we show that two fundamental anti-unitary symmetries, time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries, are topologically equivalent in the complex energy plane and hence unified in non-Hermitian physics. A striking consequence of this symmetry unification is the emergence of unique non-equilibrium topological phases that have no counterparts in Hermitian systems. We illustrate this by presenting a non-Hermitian counterpart of the Majorana chain in an insulator with time-reversal symmetry and that of the quantum spin Hall insulator in a superconductor with particle-hole symmetry. Our work establishes a fundamental symmetry principle in non-Hermitian physics and paves the way towards a unified framework for non-equilibrium topological phases. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-6336874 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2019 |
publisher | Nature Publishing Group UK |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-63368742019-01-22 Topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-Hermitian physics Kawabata, Kohei Higashikawa, Sho Gong, Zongping Ashida, Yuto Ueda, Masahito Nat Commun Article Topological phases are enriched in non-equilibrium open systems effectively described by non-Hermitian Hamiltonians. While several properties unique to non-Hermitian topological systems were uncovered, the fundamental role of symmetry in non-Hermitian physics has yet to be fully understood, and it has remained unclear how symmetry protects non-Hermitian topological phases. Here we show that two fundamental anti-unitary symmetries, time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries, are topologically equivalent in the complex energy plane and hence unified in non-Hermitian physics. A striking consequence of this symmetry unification is the emergence of unique non-equilibrium topological phases that have no counterparts in Hermitian systems. We illustrate this by presenting a non-Hermitian counterpart of the Majorana chain in an insulator with time-reversal symmetry and that of the quantum spin Hall insulator in a superconductor with particle-hole symmetry. Our work establishes a fundamental symmetry principle in non-Hermitian physics and paves the way towards a unified framework for non-equilibrium topological phases. Nature Publishing Group UK 2019-01-17 /pmc/articles/PMC6336874/ /pubmed/30655542 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-08254-y Text en © The Author(s) 2019 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
spellingShingle | Article Kawabata, Kohei Higashikawa, Sho Gong, Zongping Ashida, Yuto Ueda, Masahito Topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-Hermitian physics |
title | Topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-Hermitian physics |
title_full | Topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-Hermitian physics |
title_fullStr | Topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-Hermitian physics |
title_full_unstemmed | Topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-Hermitian physics |
title_short | Topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-Hermitian physics |
title_sort | topological unification of time-reversal and particle-hole symmetries in non-hermitian physics |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6336874/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30655542 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-08254-y |
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