Valley Order in Moiré Topological Insulators

Abstract: Moir\'e materials with opposite non-zero miniband Chern numbers in time-reversal-partner valleys are two-dimensional topological insulators at band filling $\nu=2$. We explore the possibility that in this class of moir'e materials intervalley coherence can sometimes be present in interaction induced insulators at band filling $\nu=1$ , using Landau levels with opposite signs of the magnetic field as a convenient generic model. In the absence of intravalley interactions the mean-field ground state at filling factor $\nu=1$ is a gapless intervalley coherent state that maps under a particle-hole transformation of one valley to a strong-field superconducting vortex-lattice state that has been studied previously. When the ratio $\lambda$ of intravalley to intervalley interactions is increased, gapped states appear, one with broken time-reversal symmetry and a quantized Hall effect but no valley polarization and one with broken parity symmetry and zero Hall conductivity. We discuss the possibility that the latter state could be related to the fractional quantum spin Hall effect recently observed at an odd filling factor in a moir'e topological insulator and comment on related systems in which correlations between electrons in bands with opposite Chern numbers might play a key role.