Topology induced anomalous defect production by crossing a quantum critical point

TL;DR

This paper investigates how topological edge states influence defect formation during quantum phase transitions, revealing that topology can alter defect scaling laws and that edge states are resilient to defect production.

Contribution

It demonstrates that topological features fundamentally modify defect dynamics during quantum critical crossings, challenging traditional Kibble-Zurek predictions.

Findings

Edge states significantly alter defect production during quantum quenches.

Defect density is governed by topological properties, not universal scaling.

Edge states remain robust against defect formation.

Abstract

We study the influence of topology on the quench dynamics of a system driven across a quantum critical point. We show how the appearance of certain edge states, which fully characterise the topology of the system, dramatically modifies the process of defect production during the crossing of the critical point. Interestingly enough, the density of defects is no longer described by the Kibble-Zurek scaling, but determined instead by the non-universal topological features of the system. Edge states are shown to be robust against defect production, which highlights their topological nature.