Special CPM Seminar

Topological Physics in Band Insulators

Eugene Mele

University of Pennsylvania

Topological insulators are a recently discovered quantum electronic phase of matter. This talk will give a brief overview of the known electronic phases of matter, focusing on the unique properties of topological insulators and their discovery from a careful consideration of the low energy electronic physics of single-layer graphene. Closely related ideas are then used to analyze the electronic behavior of multilayer graphenes including gapped bilayer graphene and ‘twisted’ graphenes where topological considerations introduce unexpectedly rich low energy physics.