Exploring Topological Materials in Semiconductor Fabrication

By Ibtisam AbbasiReviewed by Louis CastelMar 19 2025

The electronics industry is one of the largest sectors in terms of revenue, driven largely by the production of semiconductor devices and integrated circuits. Innovation is crucial in semiconductor manufacturing to enhance operational processes, reduce costs, and develop highly efficient nanoscale chips.¹

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Topological Phenomena in Materials

In physics, topology explores the properties of materials that remain unchanged when a system is deformed or bent under stress. It plays a critical role in analyzing and controlling the electronic properties of materials and has also influenced optics by examining non-dynamical phases arising from quantum wave functions. Topology also plays a role in developing optical frameworks that closely replicate solid-state systems, known as topological insulators, which have the potential to significantly impact the future of semiconductors.²

Overview of Topological Insulators

With the advancements in materials sciences, novel materials have been developed, which possess unique quantum–mechanical and electrical properties entirely different from traditional materials. Topological Insulators (TI) are a distinct class of topological materials in which the wave functions governing their electronic states extend across a Hilbert space.³

As a result, topological insulators exhibit unique electrical properties, acting as insulators in their bulk state while maintaining conductivity along their edges or surfaces. Topological insulators feature topologically protected metallic Dirac surfaces with a Dirac point that can pass through the band gap, enabling surface conductivity.

Quantum Hall Effect (QHE) and Topological Insulators (TI)

With the discovery of the integer quantum hall effect (QHE) in 2D-electron gas, the study of topological phases in quantum matter rose to new heights. The longitudinal conductance decreases, while the Hall conductance is quantized at  v e2/ h. The integer v, known as the topological invariant of a quantum phase, denotes the number of conducting chiral channels at the system's edges, remaining unaffected by the specimen’s geometry or the presence of impurities.⁴

TI are characterized by the formation of Dirac fermion gas covering their surfaces. The Hall conductance of massless Dirac fermions follows a half-integer quantization, given by v = n + 1/2, where n arises from the Berry phase acquired by massless Dirac fermions undergoing cyclotron motion around the Fermi surface.⁵ QHE in topological insulators occurs due to their intrinsic properties, while in traditional material a very strong magnetic field is required to observe the phenomena.

QHE has been observed in novel Tl like Bi₂Se₂, highlighting the role of time-reversal symmetry which protects the edge states and leads to conduction without any energy loss. The edge-state conduction due to QHE is a result of topological abnormalities such as the Z₂ invariant. The novel electronic properties due to QHE in topological insulators have strengthened the use of TI for various engineering applications.⁶

Weyl Semimetals and Topological Superconductors Advancing Semiconductor Manufacturing

Gapless surface states within a bulk energy gap are considered irrefutable proof of TI. Topological surface states (TSS) also exist in Weyl semimetals (WSMs), characterized by the presence of topological Fermi arcs on their surfaces and chiral magnetic effects in the bulk.

Hermann Weyl solved the Dirac equation to predict a massless fermion, known as the Weyl Fermion. These fermions are found as low-energy fluctuations in WSMs as per the concepts of condensed matter physics. According to condensed matter physics, electronic bands disperse linearly in three-dimensional (3D) momentum space, converging at points known as Weyl nodes. For a material to exhibit Weyl semimetallic behavior, it must break either time-reversal symmetry (TRS) or lattice inversion symmetry.⁷ Experimental studies have confirmed the presence of Weyl nodes and topological Fermi arcs on the surface, proving the effects of topological phases on the electrical properties of materials, which in turn paves the way for highly efficient quantum-based semiconductors.

Like WSMs, topological superconductors are also proving to be key to the advancement of semiconductor fabrication. These materials are composed of quasiparticle excitations known as Majorana fermions, which are non-Abelian anyons and remain unaffected by local perturbations. Majorana fermions exist according to the principles of superposition, and superconductivity can be achieved through magnetism induced by a magnetic insulator.⁸

These materials are being utilized by semiconductor manufacturers in hybrid hetero-structures of epitaxial superconductor-semiconductor nanowires. The Majorana fermions in the hybrid devices comprising of these superconductors ensure that the encoded information is protected against any impurities and faults, while ensuring high speed and efficiency for quantum calculations.⁹ In this way topological superconductors open the door to high-quality quantum chips and semiconductor devices.

Advantages and Applications in Semiconductor Manufacturing

The insulating time-reversal invariant of topological materials incurs inherent strong spin-orbit interactions causing the inversion of band gap. The band inversion imparts unique electro-mechanical properties to topological materials such as the lack of backscattering, and spin-momentum locking. These attributes prove to be key in reducing power consumption, improving semiconductor device efficiency, and providing protection against impurities.

The topologically protected states leading to conduction are safe from backscattering, causing the charge/electron movement to be immune from impurities, that may affect the properties of ordinary materials at the nanoscale. This improves the efficiency of transistors and memory devices readily, automatically leading to cost-optimization.

Experimental studies have shown parallel charge conductive channels resulting from multiple surface states in topological materials. For example, in Be₂Se₃ thin films, the development of a back gate and a top gate leads to three parallel conductive paths providing faster information flow and safety of the encoded information.

Transistors made of conventional materials suffer from finite-size defects that increase the resistivity drastically and lead to the bottleneck condition of interconnects in a semiconductor device, significantly reducing efficiency. The parallel conduction paths at the surface states are free of the impurity effects, fully utilizing the topological natures of the states, leading to reduced resistivity and enhanced electron flow.¹⁰ These properties ensure that topological materials are expected to play a vital role in the fabrication of information-processing devices for many years to come.

Challenges to Topological Materials

A key challenge with topological materials is the difficulty of definitively accessing topological surface states through electrical transport measurements. Anti-site defects are incorporated in Tis, resulting in enhanced bulk carrier concentration. In this condition, the surface states and bulk state both contribute to the conductivity, and electron transport. This makes experimentally determining the contribution of surface states towards the performance of semiconductors highly challenging.¹¹

Moreover, generating the strong magnetic fields required to induce quantum effects in topological materials is both costly and time-consuming. This makes large-scale fabrication of topological semiconductor devices extremely demanding. Finally, integrating topological materials into the existing infrastructure, which primarily relies on silicon, is a complex challenge, with experts expressing concerns about its reliability.

Future Outlook

The future holds great things for topological semiconductors. 2D topological semimetals are becoming a top priority for the manufacturing of high-quality Terahertz detectors. The low energy excitations in these novel topological materials enable them to function efficiently with a wide detection band.¹² Technologies like electrostatic engineering have also matured, leading to fast manufacturing of topological films for semiconductor devices.

Additionally, the recent advancements in material sciences and engineering have enabled us to manipulate organic semiconductors to utilize different exciton topological states, providing new platforms for novel high-quality LEDs.¹³ These innovations will surely strengthen the topological materials market for semiconductor manufacturing, ushering in a new era of high-quality thermos-electronics.

Further Reading

1. Jain, N. et. al. (2025). Recent Developments in Semiconductor Wafer Fabrication: Materials, Processes, and Innovations. Journal of Global Research in Electronics and Communications (JGREC). 2(2). 08-12. 2321-3175. Available at: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.14993769
2. Simon, D. S. (2018). Topology and physics: a historical overview. Tying Light in Knots: Applying Topology to Optics. 1-7. Available at: https://iopscience.iop.org/book/mono/978-1-64327-234-4/chapter/bk978-1-64327-234-4ch1.pdf
3. Ando, Y. (2013). Topological insulator materials. Journal of the Physical Society of Japan, 82(10). 1-32. 102001. . Available at: https://doi.org/10.7566/JPSJ.82.102001
4. Hatsugai, Y. (1993). Chern number and edge states in the integer quantum Hall effect. Phys. Rev. Lett. 71, 3697–3700. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.71.3697
5. Zhang, SB. et. al. (2015). Edge states and integer quantum Hall effect in topological insulator thin films. Sci Rep 5, 13277. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1038/srep13277
6. Qi, X. et. al. (2010). The quantum spin Hall effect and topological insulators. Physics Today, 63(1), 33-38. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1063/1.3293411
7. Yan, B. et. al. (2017). Topological materials: Weyl semimetals. Annual Review of Condensed Matter Physics, 8(1), 337-354. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-conmatphys-031016-025458
8. Leijnse, M., & Flensberg, K. (2012). Introduction to topological superconductivity and Majorana fermions. Semiconductor Science and Technology, 27(12), 124003. Available at: https://www.doi.org/10.1088/0268-1242/27/12/124003
9. Frolov, S. et. al. (2020). Topological superconductivity in hybrid devices. Nat. Phys. 16, 718–724. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-020-0925-6
10. Gilbert, M. (2021). Topological electronics. Commun Phys 4, 70. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1038/s42005-021-00569-5
11. Pereira, V. et. al. (2021). Challenges of topological insulator research: Bi2Te3 thin films and magnetic heterostructures. physica status solidi (b), 258(1), 2000346. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/pssb.202000346
12. Li, Y. et. al. (2024). Two-dimensional topological semimetals: an emerging candidate for terahertz detectors and on-chip integration. Materials Horizons, 11(11), 2572-2602. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1039/D3MH02250A
13. Jankowski, W. et. al. (2024). Excitonic topology and quantum geometry in organic semiconductors. arXiv preprint arXiv:2406.11951. Available at: https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2406.11951

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