Interacting Majorana chain: Transport properties and signatures of an emergent two-dimensional weak topological phase

Abstract

We study a one-dimensional chain of 2N Majorana bound states, which interact through a local quartic interaction. This model describes for example the edge physics of a quasi-one-dimensional (1D) stack of 2N Kitaev chains with modified time-reversal symmetry TγiT−1=γi, which precludes the presence of quadratic coupling. The ground state of our 1D Majorana chain displays a fourfold periodicity in N, corresponding to the four distinct topological classes of the stacked Kitaev chains. We analyze the transport properties of the 1D Majorana chain, when probed by local conductors located at its ends. We find that for finite but large N, the scattering matrix partially reflects the fourfold periodicity, and the chain exhibits strikingly different transport properties for different chain lengths. In the thermodynamic limit, the 1D Majorana chain hosts a robust many-body zero mode, which indicates that the corresponding stacked two-dimensional bulk system realizes a weak topological phase.