Antiferromagnetic Chern Insulators in Noncentrosymmetric Systems

Phys Rev Lett. 2018 Apr 13;120(15):157205. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.120.157205.

Abstract

We investigate a new class of topological antiferromagnetic (AF) Chern insulators driven by electronic interactions in two-dimensional systems without inversion symmetry. Despite the absence of a net magnetization, AF Chern insulators (AFCI) possess a nonzero Chern number C and exhibit the quantum anomalous Hall effect (QAHE). Their existence is guaranteed by the bifurcation of the boundary line of Weyl points between a quantum spin Hall insulator and a topologically trivial phase with the emergence of AF long-range order. As a concrete example, we study the phase structure of the honeycomb lattice Kane-Mele model as a function of the inversion-breaking ionic potential and the Hubbard interaction. We find an easy z axis C=1 AFCI phase and a spin-flop transition to a topologically trivial xy plane collinear antiferromagnet. We propose experimental realizations of the AFCI and QAHE in correlated electron materials and cold atom systems.