Heterostructures of graphene and topological insulators Bi₂Se₃, Bi₂Te₃, and Sb₂Te₃

Prototypical three-dimensional topological insulators of the Bi$_2$Se$_3$ family provide a beautiful example of the appearance of the surface states inside the bulk band gap caused by spin-orbit coupling-induced topology. The surface states are protected against back scattering by time reversal symmetry, and exhibit spin-momentum locking whereby the electron spin is polarized perpendicular to the momentum, typically in the plane of the surface. On the other hand, graphene is a prototypical two-dimensional material, with negligible spin-orbit coupling. When graphene is placed on the surface of a topological insulator, giant spin-orbit coupling is induced by the proximity effect, enabling interesting novel electronic properties of its Dirac electrons. We present a detailed theoretical study of the proximity effects of monolayer graphene and topological insulators Bi$_2$Se$_3$, Bi$_2$Te$_3$, and Sb$_2$Te$_3$, and elucidate the appearance of the qualitatively new spin-orbit splittings well described by a phenomenological Hamiltonian, by analyzing the orbital decomposition of the involved band structures. This should be useful for building microscopic models of the proximity effects between the surfaces of the topological insulators and graphene.