Quantized fields induced topological features in Harper-Hofstadter model

Abstract

Classical magnetic fields might change the properties of topological insulators such as the time reversal symmetry protected topological edge states. This poses a question that whether quantized fields would change differently the feature of topological materials with respect to the classical one. In this paper, we propose a model to describe topological insulators (ultracold atoms in square optical lattices with magnetic field) coupled to a tunable single-mode quantized field, and discuss the topological features of the system. We find that the quantized field can induce topological quantum phase transitions in a different way. To be specific, for fixed gauge magnetic flux ratio, we calculate the energy bands for different coupling constants between the systems and the fields in both open and periodic boundary conditions. We find that the Hofstadter butterfly graph is divided into a pair for continuous gauge magnetic flux ratio, which is different from the one without single-mode quantized field. In addition, we plot topological phase diagrams characterized by Chern number as a function of the momentum of the single-mode quantized field and obtain a quantized structure with non-zero filling factor.