Symmetry Protected Topological Charge in Symmetry Broken Phase: Spin-Chern, Spin-Valley-Chern and Mirror-Chern Numbers

Abstract

The Chern number is a genuine topological number. On the other hand, a symmetry protected topological (SPT) charge is a topological number only when a symmetry exists. We propose a formula for the SPT charge as a derivative of the Chern number in terms of the Green function in such a way that it is valid and related to the associated Hall current even when the symmetry is broken. We estimate the amount of deviation from the quantized value as a function of the strength of the broken symmetry. We present two examples. First, we consider Dirac electrons with the spin-orbit coupling on honeycomb lattice, where the SPT charges are given by the spin-Chern, valley-Chern and spin-valley-Chern numbers. Though the spin-Chern charge is not quantized in the presence of the Rashba coupling, the deviation is estimated to be $10^{-7}$ in the case of silicene, a silicon cousin of graphene. Second, we analyze the effect of the mirror-symmetry breaking of the mirror-Chern number in a thin-film of topological crystalline insulator.