arXiv subjects

Yan-Bin Yang

Publications and source records attributed to Yan-Bin Yang.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Fractional Chern Insulators in Twisted Bilayer Optical Lattices

Twisted bilayer materials provide a versatile platform for realizing novel topological states. Motivated by recent experimental realization of atomic Bose-Einstein condensates in twisted bilayer optical lattices, we theoretically investigate topological states for cold atoms trapped in such a system. At single-particle level, the system hosts nearly flat moir\'{e} bands under appropriate experimental parameters. Although these noninteracting bands are topologically trivial in the Altland-Zirnbauer classification, we find that atomic interactions can induce a flat Chern band based on self-consistent Hartree-Fock calculations. Furthermore, exact diagonalization identifies a fractional Chern insulator phase at fractional filling. Our work thus paves the way for exploring strongly correlated topological phases in highly tunable twisted bilayer optical lattices.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2024

New HI observations Toward the NGC 5055 Galaxy Group with FAST

We report a new high-sensitivity HI mapping observation of the NGC 5055 galaxy group over an area of $1.^\circ5\times0.^\circ75$ with the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST). Our observation reveals that the warped H\,{\sc i} disk of NGC~5055 is more extended than what previously observed by WSRT, out to $ 23.'9$ (61.7 kpc). The total HI mass of NGC 5055 is determined to be $\rm\sim 1.1\times10^{10}\,M_\odot$. We identified three HI clouds with HI masses of the order of $\rm \sim 10^7\,M_\odot$ at the southeastern edge of the HI disk, as well as a candidate high-velocity cloud with an HI mass of $\rm (1.2\pm0.5) \times10^6\,M_\odot$ to the north of NGC 5055. The HI content of UGCA 337 is robustly detected for the first time by the FAST observations. It has a narrow HI linewidth of $W_{50}=17.4\pm3.8$ km s$^{-1}$ with a total \HI\ mass of ($\rm 3.5\pm0.3)\times10^6\,M_\odot$. Comparing the gas content and g-r color of UGCA 337 with typical low-mass dwarf galaxies, UGCA~337 appears relatively gas-poor despite its blue color. This suggests that UGCA 337 may have undergone gas stripping in the past. We also analyzed the possible origin of the diffuse HI clouds located at the outskirts of NGC 5055, and speculate that they might be the remnant features of a merger event in the past.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

Fractional Quantum Hall Effect Based on Weyl Orbits

The fractional quantum Hall effect is a well-known demonstration of strongly correlated topological phases in two dimensions. However, the extension of this phenomenon into a three-dimensional context has yet to be achieved. Recently, the three-dimensional integer quantum Hall effect based on Weyl orbits has been experimentally observed in a topological semimetallic material under a magnetic field. This motivates us to ask whether the Weyl orbits can give rise to the fractional quantum Hall effect when their Landau level is partially filled in the presence of interactions. Here we theoretically demonstrate that the fractional quantum Hall states based on Weyl orbits can emerge in a Weyl semimetal when a Landau level is one-third filled. Using concrete models for Weyl semimetals in magnetic fields, we project the Coulomb interaction onto a single Landau level from the Weyl orbit and find that the ground state of the many-body Hamiltoian is triply degenerate. We further show that the ground states exhibit the many-body Chern number of $1/3$ and the uniform occupation of electrons in both momentum and real space, implying that they are the fractional quantum Hall states. In contrast to the two-dimensional case, the states are spatially localized on two surfaces hosting Fermi arcs. Additionally, our findings suggest that the excitation properties of these states resemble those of the Laughlin state in two dimensions, as inferred from the particle entanglement spectrum of the ground states.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2024

Higher-order topological phases in crystalline and non-crystalline systems: a review

In recent years, higher-order topological phases have attracted great interest in various fields of physics. These phases have protected boundary states at lower-dimensional boundaries than the conventional first-order topological phases due to the higher-order bulk-boundary correspondence. In this review, we summarize current research progress on higher-order topological phases in both crystalline and non-crystalline systems. We firstly introduce prototypical models of higher-order topological phases in crystals and their topological characterizations. We then discuss effects of quenched disorder on higher-order topology and demonstrate disorder-induced higher-order topological insulators. We also review the theoretical studies on higher-order topological insulators in amorphous systems without any crystalline symmetry and higher-order topological phases in nonperiodic lattices including quasicrystals, hyperbolic lattices, and fractals, which have no crystalline counterparts. We conclude the review by a summary of experimental realizations of higher-order topological phases and discussions on potential directions for future study.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2022

The Dark Matter Tidal Stripping History of the Sagittarius Core with N-body simulations

The infall of the Sagittarius (Sgr) Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxy in the Milky Way halo is an unique opportunity to understand how the different components of a dwarf galaxy could be tidally removed. In this work, we reconstruct the Sgr core morphology and kinematics on the basis of a model that has already successfully reproduced the Sgr stream. Here we use a very high resolution model that almost resolves individual stars in the Sgr core. It reproduces most of the observed morphology and kinematic properties, without specific fine-tuning. We also show that the dark matter may have been almost entirely stripped by Milky Way tides after two passages at pericenter. Finally the model predicts that the Sgr core will be fully disrupted within the next 2 Gyr.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2022

Topological Quantum Phase Transitions in Metallic Shiba Lattices

Shiba bands formed by overlapping Yu-Shiba-Rusinov subgap states in magnetic impurities on a superconductor play an important role in topological superconductors. Here, we theoretically demonstrate the existence of a new type of Shiba bands (dubbed topological Shiba metal) on a magnetically doped $s$-wave superconducting surface with Rashba spin-orbit coupling in the presence of a weak in-plane magnetic field. Such topological gapless Shiba bands develop from gapped Shiba bands through Lifshitz phase transitions accompanied by second-order quantum phase transitions for the intrinsic thermal Hall conductance. We also find a mechanism in Shiba lattices that protects the first-order quantum phase transitions for the intrinsic thermal Hall conductance. Due to the long-range hopping in Shiba lattices, the topological Shiba metal exhibits intrinsic thermal Hall conductance with large nonquantized values. As a consequence, there emerge a large number of second-order quantum phase transitions.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2022

Reconstructing the whole 6D properties of the Sagittarius stream with N-body simulations

It is a challenge to reproduce the full 6D space-phase properties of Sagittarius (Sgr) dwarf galaxy and its Stream simultaneously. Using N-body simulations with a Milky Way mass of 5.2$\times10^{11}$ M$_{\odot}$ and a ``scaling down'' Sgr mass of 9.3$\times10^{8}$ M$_{\odot}$, from a qualitative point of view, we have been able to reproduce well all 3D spatial features of Sgr stream, including its core, leading and trailing arms, and their associated bifurcations, moreover, the overall trend of the reported 3D kinematics properties of the Sgr stream have also been reproduced without fine tuning. Furthermore, we also find that our model fails in reproducing the exact behaviours of the line-of-sight velocity and angular-energy distributions. It let us to suggest that significant further progress might be achievable after introducing a major component in the Sgr progenitor, which is the gas that dominates all Irregular dwarf galaxies in the Sgr mass range and can slow down the radial velocity of Sgr before its removal, if gas can not solve this problem then we will consider a non-spherical Milky Way halo with hot gas, LMC, etc. As the first step for us to towards the complete understanding of the Sgr system, this progress is also advancing our understanding of the bifurcations, the generation of which might be due to the MW shocks at each pericenter passage, and also be linked to the orientation and disk-shape in the initial conditions.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

Symmetry-Protected Topological Phases in a Rydberg Glass

Recent theoretical studies predict that structural disorder, serving as a bridge connecting a crystalline material to an amorphous material, can induce a topological insulator from a trivial phase. However, to experimentally observe such a topological phase transition is very challenging due to the difficulty in controlling structural disorder in a quantum material. Given experimental realization of randomly positioned Rydberg atoms, such a system is naturally suited to studying structural disorder induced topological phase transitions and topological amorphous phases. Motivated by the development, we study topological phases in an experimentally accessible one-dimensional amorphous Rydberg atom chain with random atom configurations. In the single-particle level, we find symmetry-protected topological amorphous insulators and a structural disorder induced topological phase transition, indicating that Rydberg atoms provide an ideal platform to experimentally observe the phenomenon using state-of-the-art technologies. Furthermore, we predict the existence of a gapless symmetry-protected topological phase of interacting bosons in the experimentally accessible system. The resultant many-body topological amorphous phase is characterized by a $\mathbb{Z}_2$ invariant.

cond-mat.dis-nn↗

arXiv2021

Structural Disorder Induced Second-order Topological Insulators in Three Dimensions

Higher-order topological insulators are established as topological crystalline insulators protected by crystalline symmetries. One celebrated example is the second-order topological insulator in three dimensions that hosts chiral hinge modes protected by crystalline symmetries. Since amorphous solids are ubiquitous, it is important to ask whether such a second-order topological insulator can exist in an amorphous system without any spatial order. Here we predict the existence of a secondorder topological insulating phase in an amorphous system without any crystalline symmetry. Such a topological phase manifests in the winding number of the quadrupole moment, the quantized longitudinal conductance and the hinge states. Furthermore, in stark contrast to the viewpoint that structural disorder should be detrimental to the higher-order topological phase, we remarkably find that structural disorder can induce a second-order topological insulator from a topologically trivial phase in a regular geometry. We finally demonstrate the existence of a second-order topological phase in amorphous systems with time-reversal symmetry.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2021

Higher-order Topological Anderson Insulators

We study disorder effects in a two-dimensional system with chiral symmetry and find that disorder can induce a quadrupole topological insulating phase (a higher-order topological phase with quadrupole moments) from a topologically trivial phase. Their topological properties manifest in a topological invariant defined based on effective boundary Hamiltonians, the quadrupole moment, and zero-energy corner modes. We find gapped and gapless topological phases and a Griffiths regime. In the gapless topological phase, all the states are localized, while in the Griffiths regime, the states at zero energy become multifractal. We further apply the self-consistent Born approximation to show that the induced topological phase arises from disorder renormalized masses. We finally introduce a practical experimental scheme with topoelectrical circuits where the predicted topological phenomena can be observed by impedance measurements. Our work opens the door to studying higher-order topological Anderson insulators and their localization properties.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2020

Hinge solitons in three-dimensional second-order topological insulators

A second-order topological insulator in three dimensions refers to a topological insulator with gapless states localized on the hinges, which is a generalization of a traditional topological insulator with gapless states localized on the surfaces. Here we theoretically demonstrate the existence of stable solitons localized on the hinges of a second-order topological insulator in three dimensions when nonlinearity is involved. By means of systematic numerical study, we find that the soliton has strong localization in real space and propagates along the hinge unidirectionally without changing its shape. We further construct an electric network to simulate the second-order topological insulator. When a nonlinear inductor is appropriately involved, we find that the system can support a bright soliton for the voltage distribution demonstrated by stable time evolution of a voltage pulse.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2020

Type-II quadrupole topological insulators

Modern theory of electric polarization is formulated by the Berry phase, which, when quantized, leads to topological phases of matter. Such a formulation has recently been extended to higher electric multipole moments, through the discovery of the so-called quadupole topological insulator. It has been established by a classical electromagnetic theory that in a two-dimensional material the quantized properties for the quadupole topological insulator should satisfy a basic relation. Here we discover a new type of quadrupole topological insulator (dubbed type-II) that violates this relation due to the breakdown of the correspondence that a Wannier band and an edge energy spectrum close their gaps simultaneously. We find that, similar to the previously discovered (referred to as type-I) quadrupole topological insulator, the type-II hosts topologically protected corner states carrying fractional corner charges. However, the edge polarizations only occur at a pair of boundaries in the type-II insulating phase, leading to the violation of the classical constraint. We demonstrate that such new topological phenomena can appear from quench dynamics in non-equilibrium systems, which can be experimentally observed in ultracold atomic gases. We also propose an experimental scheme with electric circuits to realize such a new topological phase of matter. The existence of the new topological insulating phase means that new multipole topological insulators with distinct properties can exist in broader contexts beyond classical constraints.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2020

Higher-order topological insulators and semimetals in generalized Aubry-André-Harper models

Higher-order topological phases of matter have been extensively studied in various areas of physics. While the Aubry-André-Harper model provides a paradigmatic example to study topological phases, it has not been explored whether a generalized Aubry-André-Harper model can exhibit a higher-order topological phenomenon. Here, we construct a two-dimensional higher-order topological insulator with chiral symmetry based on the Aubry-André-Harper model. We find the coexistence of zero-energy and nonzero energy corner-localized modes. The former is protected by the quantized quadrupole moment, while the latter by the first Chern number of the Wannier band. The nonzero-energy mode can also be viewed as the consequence of a Chern insulator localized on a surface. More interestingly, the non-zero energy corner mode can lie in the continuum of extended bulk states and form a bound state in the continuum of higher-order topological systems. We finally propose an experimental scheme to realize our model in electric circuits. Our study opens a door to further study higher-order topological phases based on the Aubry-André-Harper model.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2020

Topological Insulators beyond Energy Band Characterization

Topological phases of matter are generally characterized by topological properties of energy bands of a system. Their transitions under preserved symmetries occur through closing a gap of energy bands, leading to topologically protected edge states in energy spectra in topological phases. Here we predict a new topological phase that emerges through closing a gap of bands constructed by energy bands, instead of through closing an energy gap with preserved symmetries. From this perspective, topological phases may arise from topological properties of the "bands of bands" associated with their gap closure and corresponding edge states. We demonstrate this idea by studying a tight-binding model. We find that the Wannier bands constructed by energy bands exhibit a gap closure associated with a change of a winding number, while the energy bands remain gapped and trivial without any zero energy modes. In addition, the topological Wannier bands give rise to quantized edge polarizations. Since the emergence of this topological phase does not involve any energy gap closure, we expect its appearance under unitary time evolution. Indeed, this phase appears as we perform a quench dynamics. Our study opens a new direction for exploring topological phases beyond conventional energy band characterization.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2019

Topological Amorphous Metals

We study amorphous systems with completely random sites and find that, through constructing and exploring a concrete model Hamiltonian, such a system can host an exotic phase of topological amorphous metal in three dimensions. In contrast to the traditional Weyl semimetals, topological amorphous metals break translational symmetry, and thus cannot be characterized by the first Chern number defined based on the momentum space band structures. Instead, their topological properties will manifest in the Bott index and the Hall conductivity as well as the surface states. By studying the energy band and quantum transport properties, we find that topological amorphous metals exhibit a diffusive metal behavior. We further introduce a practical experimental proposal with electric circuits where the predicted phenomena can be observed using state-of-the-art technologies. Our results open a door for exploring topological gapless phenomena in amorphous systems.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2019

Topological Phases in Non-Hermitian Aubry-André-Harper Models

Topological phases have recently witnessed a rapid progress in non-Hermitian systems. Here we study a one-dimensional non-Hermitian Aubry-André-Harper model with imaginary periodic or quasiperiodic modulations. We demonstrate that the non-Hermitian off-diagonal AAH models can host zero-energy modes at the edges. In contrast to the Hermitian case, the zero-energy mode can be localized only at one edge. Such a topological phase corresponds to the existence of a quarter winding number defined by eigenenergy in momentum space. We further find the coexistence of a zero-energy mode located only at one edge and topological nonzero energy edge modes characterized by a generalized Bott index. In the incommensurate case, a topological non-Hermitian quasicrystal is predicted where all bulk states and two topological edge states are localized at one edge. Such topological edge modes are protected by the generalized Bott index. Finally, we propose an experimental scheme to realize these non-Hermitian models in electric circuits. Our findings add a new direction for exploring topological properties in Aubry-André-Harper models.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2018

Dynamical Weyl Points and 4D Nodal Rings in Cold Atomic Gases

Controllability of ultracold atomic gases has reached an unprecedented level, allowing for experimental realization of the long-sought-after Thouless pump, which can be interpreted as a dynamical quantum Hall effect. On the other hand, Weyl semimetals and Weyl nodal line semimetals with touching points and rings in band structures have sparked tremendous interest in various fields in the past few years. Here, we show that dynamical Weyl points and dynamical 4D Weyl nodal rings, which are protected by the first Chern number on a parameter surface formed by quasi-momentum and time, emerge in a two-dimensional and three-dimensional system, respectively. We find that the topological pump occurs in these systems but the amount of pumped particles is not quantized and can be continuously tuned by controlling experimental parameters over a wide range. We also propose an experimental scheme to realize the dynamical Weyl points and 4D Weyl nodal rings and to observe their corresponding topological pump in cold atomic gases.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2011

Multicolor Photometry Study of the Galaxy Cluster A2589: Dynamics, Luminosity Function and Star Formation History

In this paper we present a multicolor photometry for A2589 ($z=0.0414$) with 15 intermediate bands in the Beijing-Arizona-Taiwan-Connecticut (BATC) system which covers an optical wavelength range from 3000 Å to 10000 Å. The spectral energy distributions (SEDs) for more than 5000 sources are achieved down to {\it V} $\sim$ 20 mag in about 1 deg$^{2}$ field. A2589 has been also covered by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) in photometric mode only. A cross-identification of the BATC-detected galaxies with the SDSS photometric catalog achieves 1199 galaxies brighter than $i=19.5$ mag, among which 68 member galaxies with known spectroscopic redshifts are found. After combining the SDSS five-band photometric data and the BATC SEDs, the technique of photometric redshift is applied to these galaxies for selecting faint member galaxies. The color-magnitude relation is taken as a further restriction of early-type cluster galaxies. As a result, 106 galaxies are newly selected as member galaxies. Spatial distribution of member galaxies shows a north-south elongation which agrees with the X-ray brightness profile and the orientation of central cD galaxy, NGC 7647. No substructures are detected on the basis of positions and radial velocities of cluster galaxies, indicating that A2589 is a well-relaxed system. The luminosity function of A2589 exhibits a peak at $M_{R} \sim -20$ mag and a dip at $M_{R} \sim -19 $ mag. The low-density outer regions are the preferred habitat of faint galaxies. With the evolutionary population synthesis model, PEGASE, the environmental effect on the star formation properties for 68 spectroscopically confirmed member galaxies is studied. The outlier faint galaxies tend to have longer time scales of star formation, shorter mean stellar ages, and lower metallicities of interstellar medium, which can be interpreted in the context of hierarchical cosmological scenario.

astro-ph.GA↗