Microscopic theory of Chern polarization via crystalline defect charge

TL;DR

This paper develops a new, unambiguous way to define the polarization of Chern insulators using the Zak phase, applicable even without crystalline symmetries, by analyzing fractional charges bound to lattice dislocations.

Contribution

It introduces a bulk-based polarization definition for Chern insulators that overcomes limitations of previous methods relying on Wannier functions.

Findings

Provides a gauge-invariant polarization expression for Chern insulators.

Connects fractional dislocation charges to bulk topological properties.

Applicable to systems without crystalline symmetries besides translation.

Abstract

The modern theory of polarization does not apply in its original form to systems with non-trivial band topology. Chern insulators are one such example. Defining polarization for them is complicated because they are insulating in the bulk but exhibit metallic edge states. Wannier functions formed a key ingredient of the original modern theory of polarization, but it has been considered that these cannot be applied to Chern insulators since they are no longer exponentially localized and the Wannier center, obtained from the Zak phase, is no longer gauge invariant. In this article, we provide an unambiguous definition of absolute polarization for a Chern insulator in terms of the Zak phase. We obtain our expression by studying the non-quantized fractional charge bound to lattice dislocations. Our expression can be computed directly from bulk quantities and makes no assumption on the edge state filling. It is fully consistent with previous results on the quantized charge bound to dislocations in the presence of crystalline symmetry. At the same time, our result is more general since it also applies to Chern insulators which do not have crystalline symmetries other than translations.