Classification of interacting electronic topological insulators in three dimensions

Understand

A fundamental open problem in condensed matter physics is how the dichotomy between conventional and topological band insulators is modified in the presence of strong electron interactions.

• We show that there are 6 new electronic topological insulators that have no non-interacting counterpart.
• Combined with the previously known band-insulators, these produce a total of 8 topologically distinct phases.
• Two of the new topological insulators have a simple physical description as Mott insulators in which the electron spins form spin analogs of the familiar topological band-insulator.