Charge transport and shot noise on the surface of a topological insulator with a magnetic modulation

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate the transport features and the Fano factor of Dirac electrons on the surface of a three-dimensional topological insulator with a magnetic modulation. We consider a hard wall bounding condition on the edge of the topological insulator, which implies that a surface state of the topological insulator is insulating. We find that a valley of conductivity at the Dirac point is associated with a Fano factor peak, and more interestingly, this topological metal changes from insulating to metallic by controlling the effective exchange field.