Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers

Topological insulators (TIs) are bulk insulators with exotic ‘topologically protected’ surface conducting modes. It has recently been pointed out that when stacked together, interactions between surface modes can induce diverse phases including the TI, Dirac semimetal, and Weyl semimetal. However, c...

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Main Authors:	Nguyen, Thuy-Anh, Backes, Dirk, Singh, Angadjit, Mansell, Rhodri, Barnes, Crispin, Ritchie, David A., Mussler, Gregor, Lanius, Martin, Grützmacher, Detlev, Narayan, Vijay
Format:	Online
Language:	English
Published:	Nature Publishing Group 2016
Online Access:	https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4904215/

id	pubmed-4904215
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	pubmed-49042152016-06-14 Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers Nguyen, Thuy-Anh Backes, Dirk Singh, Angadjit Mansell, Rhodri Barnes, Crispin Ritchie, David A. Mussler, Gregor Lanius, Martin Grützmacher, Detlev Narayan, Vijay Article Topological insulators (TIs) are bulk insulators with exotic ‘topologically protected’ surface conducting modes. It has recently been pointed out that when stacked together, interactions between surface modes can induce diverse phases including the TI, Dirac semimetal, and Weyl semimetal. However, currently a full experimental understanding of the conditions under which topological modes interact is lacking. Here, working with multilayers of the TI Sb2Te3 and the band insulator GeTe, we provide experimental evidence of multiple topological modes in a single Sb2Te3-GeTe-Sb2Te3 structure. Furthermore, we show that reducing the thickness of the GeTe layer induces a phase transition from a Dirac-like phase to a gapped phase. By comparing different multilayer structures we demonstrate that this transition occurs due to the hybridisation of states associated with different TI films. Our results demonstrate that the Sb2Te3-GeTe system offers strong potential towards manipulating topological states as well as towards controlledly inducing various topological phases. Nature Publishing Group 2016-06-13 /pmc/articles/PMC4904215/ /pubmed/27291288 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep27716 Text en Copyright © 2016, Macmillan Publishers Limited http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
repository_type	Open Access Journal
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	US National Center for Biotechnology Information
building	NCBI PubMed
collection	Online Access
language	English
format	Online
author	Nguyen, Thuy-Anh Backes, Dirk Singh, Angadjit Mansell, Rhodri Barnes, Crispin Ritchie, David A. Mussler, Gregor Lanius, Martin Grützmacher, Detlev Narayan, Vijay
spellingShingle	Nguyen, Thuy-Anh Backes, Dirk Singh, Angadjit Mansell, Rhodri Barnes, Crispin Ritchie, David A. Mussler, Gregor Lanius, Martin Grützmacher, Detlev Narayan, Vijay Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers
author_facet	Nguyen, Thuy-Anh Backes, Dirk Singh, Angadjit Mansell, Rhodri Barnes, Crispin Ritchie, David A. Mussler, Gregor Lanius, Martin Grützmacher, Detlev Narayan, Vijay
author_sort	Nguyen, Thuy-Anh
title	Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers
title_short	Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers
title_full	Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers
title_fullStr	Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers
title_full_unstemmed	Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers
title_sort	topological states and phase transitions in sb2te3-gete multilayers
description	Topological insulators (TIs) are bulk insulators with exotic ‘topologically protected’ surface conducting modes. It has recently been pointed out that when stacked together, interactions between surface modes can induce diverse phases including the TI, Dirac semimetal, and Weyl semimetal. However, currently a full experimental understanding of the conditions under which topological modes interact is lacking. Here, working with multilayers of the TI Sb2Te3 and the band insulator GeTe, we provide experimental evidence of multiple topological modes in a single Sb2Te3-GeTe-Sb2Te3 structure. Furthermore, we show that reducing the thickness of the GeTe layer induces a phase transition from a Dirac-like phase to a gapped phase. By comparing different multilayer structures we demonstrate that this transition occurs due to the hybridisation of states associated with different TI films. Our results demonstrate that the Sb2Te3-GeTe system offers strong potential towards manipulating topological states as well as towards controlledly inducing various topological phases.
publisher	Nature Publishing Group
publishDate	2016
url	https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4904215/
_version_	1613593332567506944

Topological states and phase transitions in Sb2Te3-GeTe multilayers

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