Topological phase transitions in line-nodal superconductors

Abstract

Fathoming interplay between symmetry and topology of many-electron wave functions has deepened our understanding of quantum many-body systems, particularly after the discovery of topological insulators. Topology of electron wave functions often enforces and protects emergent gapless excitation, and symmetry is intrinsically tied to the topological protection of the excitations. Namely, unless the symmetry is broken, the topological nature of the excitations is intact. We show intriguing phenomena of interplay between symmetry and topology in three-dimensional topological phase transitions associated with line-nodal superconductors. More specifically, we discover an exotic universality class out of topological line-nodal superconductors. The order parameter of broken symmetries is strongly correlated with underlying line-nodal fermions, and this gives rise to a large anomalous dimension in sharp contrast to that of the Landau-Ginzburg theory. Remarkably, hyperscaling violation and emergent relativistic scaling appear in spite of the presence of nonrelativistic fermionic excitation. We also propose characteristic experimental signatures around the phase transitions, for example, a linear phase boundary in a temperature-tuning parameter phase diagram, and discuss the implication of recent experiments in pnictides and heavy-fermion systems.

Source-reported materials — not catalogue approval

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