Instabilities of quadratic band crossing points

Abstract

Using a functional renormalization group approach, we study interaction-driven instabilities in quadratic band crossing point two-orbital models in two dimensions, extending a previous study of Sun et al. [1]. The wavevector-dependence of the Bloch eigenvectors of the free Hamiltonian causes interesting instabilities toward spin nematic, quantum anomalous Hall and quantum spin Hall states. In contrast with other known examples of interaction-driven topological insulators, in the system studied here, the QSH state occurs at arbitrarily small interaction strength and for rather simple intra- and inter-orbital repulsions.