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A new exotic state in an old material: a tale of SmB6

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Abstract

We review current theoretical and experimental efforts to identify a novel class of intermetallic 4f and 5f orbital materials in which strong interactions between itinerant and predominately localized degrees of freedom give rise to a bulk insulating state at low temperatures, while the surface remains metallic. This effect arises due to inversion of even-parity conduction bands and odd-parity very narrow f-electron bands. The number of band inversions is mainly determined by the crystal symmetry of a material and the corresponding degeneracy of the hybridized f-electron bands. For an odd number of band inversions, the metallic surface states are chiral and therefore remain robust against disorder and time-reversal invariant perturbations. We discuss a number of unresolved theoretical issues specific to topological Kondo insulators and outline experimental challenges in probing the chiral surface states in these materials.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, Kent State University, Kent, OH, 44242, USA

    M. Dzero

  2. Condensed Matter Theory Center and Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, 20742, USA

    V. Galitski

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  1. M. Dzero
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  2. V. Galitski
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Correspondence to V. Galitski.

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Dedicated to the memory of Professor Anatoly Larkin

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Dzero, M., Galitski, V. A new exotic state in an old material: a tale of SmB6 . J. Exp. Theor. Phys. 117, 499–507 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1134/S1063776113110083

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