Topological properties of graphene moiré superlattice systems and recent optical studies

Abstract

When 2D materials with different lattice constants or lattice rotation angles are stacked together, a periodic moiré pattern will appear. Such moiré superlattice introduces a new two dimensional periodic potential, which can greatly change the physical properties of the original systems. Recent experimental studies of moiré superlattices formed by graphene on graphene and graphene on hexagonal boron nitride have revealed very rich strong correlation effects and topological effects due to novel states in superlattice minibands. It has been shown that flat bands in graphene-based moiré superlattice systems can host both topological states and strongly correlated states, which can be controlled by an external electric field. In bilayer graphene, ABC stacked trilayer graphene and twisted bilayer-bilayer graphene, the number of valence and conduction bands near the Dirac point and even the band topology and bandwidth can be changed by varying the stacking angle between graphene layers or the applied bias voltage. Moreover, the competition between kinetic energy and coulomb interaction depends on the bandwidth and the external electric field, and at the so-called magic angle mott insulator states and superconductivity were observed. Twisted bilayer-bilayer graphene has also been predicted to show similar intriguing properties, including electrically tunable strongly correlated insulators, superconductivity and many rich topological states. In graphene-based moiré systems, the combination of topological states and strong correlations is expected to lead to a broad range of novel phenomena that are not achievable in other material systems. Therefore, graphene moiré systems is likely to bring substantial progress to the study of topological materials. In this paper, we review theoretical and experimental investigations of the topological properties of graphene moiré superlattices, including topological domain wall states in bilayer graphene and topological effects in twisted bilayer graphene, ABC trilayer graphene and twisted double bilayer graphene. The origins of topological properties of these systems are discussed as well as topological phenomena observed in various experiments. Finally, recent near-field optical studies of the band structure and novel topological properties of graphene moiré superlattices are discussed.