Topological phase transitions in the non-Hermitian SSH model with long-range hopping terms induced by gains and losses

Abstract

The latest progress in the one-dimensional chain SSH model provide the basic understanding of non-Hermitian topological phases. By periodically introducing the gains and losses of imaginary potential ig,-ig,-ig,ig with anti-PT symmetry, we have investigated the topological property of non-Hermitian SSH model with long-range hopping terms. We find that the gains and losses of imaginary potential causes the model to exhibit non-Hermiticity, and the non-Hermiticity induces system to undergo topological phase transitions from topologically trivial phase with non-Hermitian winding number 0 to topologically nontrivial phase with non-Hermitian winding number 1 and −1. The introduction of gains and losses greatly broadens the topological non-trivial region and play a non-trivial role in the model. We fully characterize the topological phase transitions by the band gap closing-reopening, the non-Hermitian winding numbers v and the hidden Chern number C.

Keywords

• Topological phase
• Phase transition
• non-Hermiticity
• SSH model