Laser-induced phase transitions of topological Kondo insulators

TL;DR

This paper explores how high-frequency laser fields can induce topological phase transitions in Kondo insulators, leading to Floquet Chern insulators and Weyl semimetals, revealing tunable topological properties.

Contribution

It provides a theoretical framework for laser-induced topological phase transitions in TKIs using Floquet theory, including the emergence of Floquet Chern insulators and Weyl semimetals.

Findings

Laser fields can induce Floquet Chern insulators with various Chern numbers.

High-intensity lasers can create Weyl nodes in three-dimensional TKIs.

Topological phases are tunable by laser light intensity.

Abstract

In this paper, we theoretically investigate how laser fields change the nature of topological Kondo insulators(TKIs). By employing a prototypical model of TKIs, we treat the effect of the laser fields with Floquet theory, which gives effective description under high frequency laser fields. We derive the effective model of TKIs under the laser irradiation and discuss its topological properties. We demonstrate a possible realization of Floquet Chern insulators specified by various values of Chern number and reveal how the topological phase changes with increasing the laser light intensity. Furthermore, it is shown that Floquet Weyl semimetals, which have some pairs of Weyl nodes protected topologically, can emerge in the three-dimensional case. We explain how the Weyl nodes are created with varying the strength of the laser field.