Topological materials and quantum entanglement

As the title implies, this thesis consists of two main topics: materials which realize topological phases of matter and applications of the concept of entanglement in understanding topological phases and their transitions. The first part will focus on a particular class of materials called topological crystalline insulators (TCI), which are bulk insulators with metallic boundary states protected by crystal mirror symmetries. The realization of TCIs in the SnTe class of materials and the anti-perovskite family will be described. The second part will focus on using entanglement notions to probe a topological phase transition, based on a single topological wavefunction. This is achieved by performing extensive partitions of the wavefunction, such as a checkerboard partition. Implementing this technique in one dimension naturally involves the use of tensor networks, which will be reviewed and then utilized.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2015

Author dc:creator

• Timothy H. Hsieh, Timothy (Timothy Hwa-wei)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Liang Fu.

• Physics.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/103228

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/103228