Topological transition of Dirac points in a microwave experiment

Matthieu Bellec, Ulrich Kuhl, Gilles Montambaux, Fabrice Mortessagne

Published 2012-10-17, updated 2012-12-17Version 2

By means of a microwave tight-binding analogue experiment of a graphene-like lattice, we observe a topological transition between a phase with a point-like band gap characteristic of massless Dirac fermions and a gapped phase. By applying a controlled anisotropy on the structure, we investigate the transition directly via density of states measurements. The wave function associated with each eigenvalue is mapped and reveals new states at the Dirac point, localized on the armchair edges. We find that with increasing anisotropy, these new states are more and more localized at the edges.