Remigiusz Durka

Topological insulators from the Maxwell algebra

The subject of the talk will concern a recent work of D. Palumbo https://arxiv.org/abs/1610.04734. It introduces interesting model of three dimensional topological insulators in the presence of the electromagnetic field, which results from the Chern-Simons theory with the gauge connection that takes values in the Maxwell algebra. The final action written in terms of the dreibein, spin connection and electromagnetic gauge potential leads to a description of the Hall conductance, the torsional Hall viscosity, and novel non-minimal coupling between the abelian gauge field and curved background, which resemble the relativistic version of the Wen-Zee term.