Boundary-induced topological and mid-gap states in charge conserving one-dimensional superconductors: Fractionalization transition

Abstract

We investigate one-dimensional charge conserving, spin-singlet (SSS), and spin-triplet (STS) superconductors in the presence of boundary fields. In systems with open boundary conditions (OBC) it has been demonstrated that STS display a fourfold topological degeneracy, protected by the Z2 symmetry, which reverses the spins of all fermions, whereas SSS are topologically trivial. In this paper we show that it is not only the type of the bulk superconducting instability that determines the eventual topological nature of a phase, but rather the interplay between bulk and boundary properties. In particular we show by means of the Bethe ansatz technique that SSS may as well be in a Z2-protected topological phase provided suitable “twisted” open boundary conditions OBĈ are imposed. More generally, we find that depending on the boundary fields, a given superconductor, either SSS or STS, may exhibit several types of phases such as topological, mid-gap, and trivial phases; each phase being characterized by a boundary fixed point, which we determine. Of particular interest are the mid-gap phases, which are stabilized close to the topological fixed point. They include fractionalized phases where spin-1/4 bound states are localized at the two edges of the system and unfractionalized phases where a spin-1/2 bound state is localized at either the left or the right edge.

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