Topological phases in gated bilayer graphene: Effects of Rashba spin-orbit coupling and exchange field

We present a systematic study on the influence of Rashba spin-orbit coupling, interlayer potential difference, and exchange field on the topological properties of bilayer graphene. In the presence of only Rashba spin-orbit coupling and interlayer potential difference, the band gap opening due to broken out-of-plane inversion symmetry offers new possibilities of realizing tunable topological phase transitions by varying an external gate voltage. We find a two-dimensional Z₂ topological insulator phase and a quantum valley Hall phase in AB-stacked bilayer graphene and obtain their effective low-energy Hamiltonians near the Dirac points. For AA stacking, we do not find any topological insulator phase in the presence of large Rashba spin-orbit coupling. When the exchange field is also turned on, the bilayer system exhibits a rich variety of topological phases including a quantum anomalous Hall phase, and we obtain the phase diagram as a function of the Rashba spin-orbit coupling, interlayer potential difference, and exchange field.