Candidates for topological insulators: Pb-based chalcogenide series

Abstract

We theoretically predict that the series of Pb-based layered chalcogenides, PbnBi2Sen+3and PbnSb2Ten+3, are possible new candidates for topological insulators, and the topological phases are changed from a topological insulator to a band insulator with increasing n. Among the new topological insulators, we found a large bulk band gap of 0.40 eV in PbBi2Se4, and that of Pb2Sb2Te5 is located near the phase boundary between a trivial and a nontrivial topological insulator, which raises the possibility of tuning the topological phase by changing the external parameters.