Topological Insulators and Nematic Phases from Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking in 2D Fermi Systems with a Quadratic Band Crossing

Abstract

We investigate the stability of a quadratic band-crossing point (QBCP) in 2D fermionic systems. At the noninteracting level, we show that a QBCP exists and is topologically stable for a Berry flux +/-2pi if the point symmetry group has either fourfold or sixfold rotational symmetries. This putative topologically stable free-fermion QBCP is marginally unstable to arbitrarily weak short-range repulsive interactions. We consider both spinless and spin-1/2 fermions. Four possible ordered states result: a quantum anomalous Hall phase, a quantum spin Hall phase, a nematic phase, and a nematic-spin-nematic phase.