Topological insulator and the theta vacuum in a system without boundaries
In this paper we address two questions concerning the effective action of a topological insulator in one- and three-dimensional space without boundaries, such as a torus. The first is whether a uniform theta term with theta=pi is generated for a strong topological insulator. The second is whether su...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
American Physical Society,
2011-09-30T14:45:16Z.
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | Get fulltext |
| Summary: | In this paper we address two questions concerning the effective action of a topological insulator in one- and three-dimensional space without boundaries, such as a torus. The first is whether a uniform theta term with theta=pi is generated for a strong topological insulator. The second is whether such a term has observable consequences in the bulk. The answers to both questions are positive, but the observability in three dimensions vanishes for infinite system size. National Science Foundation (U.S.) (NSF under Grant No. DMR 0804040) |
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