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Band-structure picture for topology in strongly correlated systems with the ghost Gutzwiller ansatz

Ivan Pasqua1,*, Antonio Maria Tagliente1, Gabriele Bellomia1, Bartomeu Monserrat2,3, Michele Fabrizio1, and Carlos Mejuto-Zaera4,†

  • *Contact author: ipasqua@sissa.it
  • †Contact author: cmejutozaera@irsamc.ups-tlse.fr
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Phys. Rev. B 113, 155133 – Published 16 April, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/dw49-y9vl

Abstract

Understanding the interplay between electronic correlations and band topology remains a central challenge in condensed matter physics, primarily hindered by a language-mismatch problem. While band topology is naturally formulated within a single-particle band theory, strong correlations typically elude such an effective one-body description. In this work, we bridge this gap by leveraging the ghost Gutzwiller (gGut) variational embedding framework, which introduces auxiliary quasiparticle degrees of freedom to recover an effective band-structure description of strongly correlated systems. This approach enables an interpretable and computationally efficient treatment of correlated topological phases, resulting in energy- and momentum-resolved topological features that are directly comparable to experimental spectra. We exemplify the advantages of this framework through a detailed study of the interacting Bernevig-Hughes-Zhang model. Not only does the gGut description reproduce established results, but it also reveals previously inaccessible aspects: most notably, the emergence of topologically nontrivial Hubbard bands hosting their own edge states, as well as possible ways to manipulate these through a finite magnetization. These results position the gGut framework as a promising tool for the predictive modeling of correlated topological materials.

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Phys. Rev. B 113, 155133– Published 16 April, 2026
  • Received 28 July 2025
  • Revised 23 January 2026
  • Accepted 18 March 2026
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