PhD Defense: Frederik Nathan

The Anomalous Floquet Insulator

Periodic driving has recently been investigated as a mechanism for generating nontrivial topological phases of matter within otherwise ordinary systems. Periodic driving can even induce new, so-called anomalous topological phases, which have no counterpart in equilibrium. In my thesis defense, I introduce the anomalous Floquet insulator (AFI), which is an example of such an anomalous topological phase. I show that the AFI is characterized by a quantized, nonzero bulk magnetization density. The results presented here moreover suggest that strong disorder can stabilize the phase in the presence of interactions.