The Emergence of Topological Nodal Points in Photonic Crystal with Mirror Symmetry

Abstract: We show that topological nodal points can emerge in photonic crystal possessing mirror symmetry. The mechanism of generating topological nodal points is discussed in a two-dimensional photonic square lattice, in which four topological nodal points split out naturally after the touching of two bands with different parity. The emergence of such nodal points, characterized by vortex structure in momentum space, is attributed to the unavoidable band crossing protected by mirror symmetry. The topological nodes can be unbuckled through breaking the mirror symmetry and a photonic Chern insulator can be achieved through time reversal symmetry breaking. The joint effect of breaking time reversal symmetry and breaking inversion symmetry is further found to strengthen the finite size effect, providing ways to engineer helical edge states.