arXiv subjects

J. K. Slingerland

Publications and source records attributed to J. K. Slingerland.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2010

Clebsch-Gordan and 6j-coefficients for rank two quantum groups

We calculate (q-deformed) Clebsch-Gordan and 6j-coefficients for rank two quantum groups. We explain in detail how such calculations are done, which should allow the reader to perform similar calculations in other cases. Moreover, we tabulate the q-Clebsch-Gordan and 6j-coefficients explicitly, as well as some other topological data associated with theories corresponding to rank-two quantum groups. Finally, we collect some useful properties of the fusion rules of particular conformal field theories.

math.QA↗

arXiv2010

Towards a non-abelian electric-magnetic symmetry: the skeleton group

We propose an electric-magnetic symmetry group in non-abelian gauge theory, which we call the skeleton group. We work in the context of non-abelian unbroken gauge symmetry, and provide evidence for our proposal by relating the representation theory of the skeleton group to the labelling and fusion rules of charge sectors. We show that the labels of electric, magnetic and dyonic sectors in non-abelian Yang-Mills theory can be interpreted in terms of irreducible representations of the skeleton group. Decomposing tensor products of these representations thus gives a set of fusion rules which contain information about the full fusion rules of these charge sectors. We demonstrate consistency of the skeleton's fusion rules with the known fusion rules of the purely electric and purely magnetic magnetic sectors, and extract new predictions for the fusion rules of dyonic sectors in particular cases. We also implement S-duality and show that the fusion rules obtained from the skeleton group commute with S-duality.

hep-th↗

arXiv2010

Topological entanglement entropy relations for multi phase systems with interfaces

We study the change in topological entanglement entropy that occurs when a two-dimensional system in a topologically ordered phase undergoes a transition to another such phase due to the formation of a Bose condensate. We also consider the topological entanglement entropy of systems with domains in different topological phases, and of phase boundaries between these domains. We calculate the topological entropy of these interfaces and derive two fundamental relations between the interface topological entropy and the bulk topological entropies on both sides of the interface.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2010

Exact results for the star lattice chiral spin liquid

We examine the star lattice Kitaev model whose ground state is a a chiral spin liquid. We fermionize the model such that the fermionic vacua are toric code states on an effective Kagome lattice. This implies that the Abelian phase of the system is inherited from the fermionic vacua and that time reversal symmetry is spontaneously broken at the level of the vacuum. In terms of these fermions we derive the Bloch-matrix Hamiltonians for the vortex free sector and its time reversed counterpart and illuminate the relationships between the sectors. The phase diagram for the model is shown to be a sphere in the space of coupling parameters around the triangles of the lattices. The abelian phase lies inside the sphere and the critical boundary between topologically distinct Abelian and non-Abelian phases lies on the surface. Outside the sphere the system is generically gapped except in the planes where the coupling parameters are zero. These cases correspond to bipartite lattice structures and the dispersion relations are similar to that of the original Kitaev honeycomb model. In a further analysis we demonstrate the three-fold non-Abelian groundstate degeneracy on a torus by explicit calculation.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2009

The non-Abelian Interferometer

We consider the tunneling current through a double point-contact Fabry-Perot interferometer such as used in recent experimental studies of the fractional quantum Hall plateau at filling fraction nu=5/2. We compare the predictions of several different models of the state of the electrons at this plateau: the Moore-Read, anti-Pfaffian, SU(2)_2 NAF, K=8 strong pairing, and (3,3,1) states. All of these predict the existence of charge e/4 quasiparticles, but the first three are non-Abelian while the last two are Abelian. We give explicit formulas for the scaling of charge e/2 and charge e/4 quasiparticle contributions to the current as a function of temperature, gate voltage and distance between the two point contacts for all three models. Based on these, we analyze several possible explanations of two phenomena reported for recent experiments by Willett et al., namely halving of the period of the observed resistance oscillations with rising temperature and alternation between the same two observed periods at low temperatures as the area of the interference loop is varied with a side gate. We conclude that the most likely explanation is that the observed alternation is due to switching between even and odd numbers of charge e/4 quasiparticles enclosed within the loop as a function of side gate voltage, which is a clear signature of the presence of non-Abelian anyons. However, there are important features of the data which do not have a simple explanation within this picture. We suggest further experiments which could help rule out some possible scenarios. We make the corresponding predictions for future tunneling and interference experiments at the other observed second Landau level fractional quantum Hall states.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2009

A Description of Kitaev's Honeycomb Model with Toric-Code Stabilizers

We present a solution of Kitaev's spin model on the honeycomb lattice and of related topologically ordered spin models. We employ a Jordan-Wigner type fermionization and find that the Hamiltonian takes a BCS type form, allowing the system to be solved by Bogoliubov transformation. Our fermionization does not employ non-physical auxiliary degrees of freedom and the eigenstates we obtain are completely explicit in terms of the spin variables. The ground-state is obtained as a BCS condensate of fermion pairs over a vacuum state which corresponds to the toric code state with the same vorticity. We show in detail how to calculate all eigenstates and eigenvalues of the model on the torus. In particular, we find that the topological degeneracy on the torus descends directly from that of the toric code, which now supplies four vacua for the fermions, one for each choice of periodic vs. anti-periodic boundary conditions. The reduction of the degeneracy in the non-Abelian phase of the model is seen to be due to the vanishing of one of the corresponding candidate BCS ground-states in that phase. This occurs in particular in the fully periodic vortex-free sector. The true ground-state in this sector is exhibited and shown to be gapped away from the three partially anti-periodic ground-states whenever the non-Abelian phase is gapped.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2008

A theory of topological edges and domain walls

We investigate domain walls between topologically ordered phases in two spatial dimensions and present a simple but general framework from which their degrees of freedom can be understood. The approach we present exploits the results on topological symmetry breaking that we have introduced and presented elsewhere. After summarizing the method, we work out predictions for the spectrum of edge excitations and for the transport through edges in some representative examples. These include domain walls between the Abelian and non-Abelian topological phases of Kitaev's honeycomb lattice model in a magnetic field, as well as recently proposed domain walls between spin polarized and unpolarized non-Abelian fractional quantum Hall states at different filling fractions.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2008

Topological degeneracy and vortex manipulation in Kitaev's honeycomb model

The classification of loop symmetries in Kitaev's honeycomb lattice model provides a natural framework to study the abelian topological degeneracy. We derive a perturbative low-energy effective Hamiltonian, that is valid to all orders of the expansion and for all possible toroidal configurations. Using this form we demonstrate at what order the system's topological degeneracy is lifted by finite size effects and note that in the thermodynamic limit it is robust to all orders. Further, we demonstrate that the loop symmetries themselves correspond to the creation, propagation and annihilation of fermions. Importantly, we note that these fermions, made from pairs of vortices, can be moved with no additional energy cost.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2008

Non-locality of non-Abelian anyons

Topological systems, such as fractional quantum Hall liquids, promise to successfully combat environmental decoherence while performing quantum computation. These highly correlated systems can support non-Abelian anyonic quasiparticles that can encode exotic entangled states. To reveal the non-local character of these encoded states we demonstrate the violation of suitable Bell inequalities. We provide an explicit recipe for the preparation, manipulation and measurement of the desired correlations for a large class of topological models. This proposal gives an operational measure of non-locality for anyonic states and it opens up the possibility to violate the Bell inequalities in quantum Hall liquids or spin lattices.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2008

Fractional Quantum Hall Hierarchy and the Second Landau Level

We generalize the fractional quantum Hall hierarchy picture to apply to arbitrary, possibly non-Abelian, fractional quantum Hall states. Applying this to the nu = 5/2 Moore-Read state, we construct new explicit trial wavefunctions to describe the fractional quantum Hall effect in the second Landau level. The resulting hierarchy of states, which reproduces the filling fractions of all observed Hall conductance plateaus in the second Landau level, is characterized by electron pairing in the ground state and an excitation spectrum that includes non-Abelian anyons of the Ising type. We propose this as a unifying picture in which p-wave pairing characterizes the fractional quantum Hall effect in the second Landau level.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2008

Condensate induced transitions between topologically ordered phases

We investigate transitions between topologically ordered phases in two spatial dimensions induced by the condensation of a bosonic quasiparticle. To this end, we formulate an extension of the theory of symmetry breaking phase transitions which applies to phases with topological excitations described by quantum groups or modular tensor categories. This enables us to deal with phases whose quasiparticles have non-integer quantum dimensions and obey braid statistics. Many examples of such phases can be constructed from two-dimensional rational conformal field theories and we find that there is a beautiful connection between quantum group symmetry breaking and certain well-known constructions in conformal field theory, notably the coset construction, the construction of orbifold models and more general conformal extensions. Besides the general framework, many representative examples are worked out in detail.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2008

Magnetic Charge Lattices, Moduli Spaces and Fusion Rules

We analyze the set of magnetic charges carried by smooth BPS monopoles in Yang-Mills-Higgs theory with arbitrary gauge group G spontaneously broken to a subgroup H. The charges are restricted by a generalized Dirac quantization condition and by an inequality due to Murray. Geometrically, the set of allowed charges is a solid cone in the coroot lattice of G, which we call the Murray cone. We argue that magnetic charge sectors correspond to points in the Murray cone divided by the Weyl group of H; hence magnetic charge sectors are labelled by dominant integral weights of the dual group H*. We define generators of the Murray cone modulo Weyl group, and interpret the monopoles in the associated magnetic charge sectors as basic; monopoles in sectors with decomposable charges are interpreted as composite configurations. This interpretation is supported by the dimensionality of the moduli spaces associated to the magnetic charges and by classical fusion properties for smooth monopoles in particular cases. Throughout the paper we compare our findings with corresponding results for singular monopoles recently obtained by Kapustin and Witten.

hep-th↗

arXiv2008

Interferometry of non-Abelian Anyons

We develop the general quantum measurement theory of non-Abelian anyons through interference experiments. The paper starts with a terse introduction to the theory of anyon models, focusing on the basic formalism necessary to apply standard quantum measurement theory to such systems. This is then applied to give a detailed analysis of anyonic charge measurements using a Mach-Zehnder interferometer for arbitrary anyon models. We find that, as anyonic probes are sent through the legs of the interferometer, superpositions of the total anyonic charge located in the target region collapse when they are distinguishable via monodromy with the probe anyons, which also determines the rate of collapse. We give estimates on the number of probes needed to obtain a desired confidence level for the measurement outcome distinguishing between charges, and explicitly work out a number of examples for some significant anyon models. We apply the same techniques to describe interferometry measurements in a double point-contact interferometer realized in fractional quantum Hall systems. To lowest order in tunneling, these results essentially match those from the Mach-Zehnder interferometer, but we also provide the corrections due to processes involving multiple tunnelings. Finally, we give explicit predictions describing state measurements for experiments in the Abelian hierarchy states, the non-Abelian Moore-Read state at $ν=5/2$ and Read-Rezayi state at $ν= 12/5$.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2007

Decoherence of Anyonic Charge in Interferometry Measurements

We examine interferometric measurements of the topological charge of (non-Abelian) anyons. The target's topological charge is measured from its effect on the interference of probe particles sent through the interferometer. We find that superpositions of distinct anyonic charges a and a' in the target decohere (exponentially in the number of probes particles used) when the probes have nontrivial monodromy with the charges that may be fused with a to give a'.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2006

Probing Non-Abelian Statistics with QuasiParticle Interferometry

We examine interferometric experiments in systems that exhibit non-Abelian braiding statistics, expressing outcomes in terms of the modular S-matrix. In particular, this result applies to FQH interferometry, and we give a detailed treatment of the Read-Rezayi states, providing explicit predictions for the recently observed nu=12/5 plateau.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2004

Abelian homotopy Dijkgraaf-Witten theory

We construct a version of Dijkgraaf-Witten theory based on a compact abelian Lie group within the formalism of Turaev's homotopy quantum field theory. As an application we show that the 2+1-dimensional theory based on U(1) classifies lens spaces up to homotopy type.

math.QA↗

arXiv2002

Hopf symmetry breaking and confinement in (2+1)-dimensional gauge theory

Gauge theories in 2+1 dimensions whose gauge symmetry is spontaneously broken to a finite group enjoy a quantum group symmetry which includes the residual gauge symmetry. This symmetry provides a framework in which fundamental excitations (electric charges) and topological excitations (magnetic fluxes) can be treated on equal footing. In order to study symmetry breaking by both electric and magnetic condensates we develop a theory of symmetry breaking which is applicable to models whose symmetry is described by a quantum group (quasitriangular Hopf algebra). Using this general framework we investigate the symmetry breaking and confinement phenomena which occur in (2+1)-dimensional gauge theories. Confinement of particles is linked to the formation of string-like defects. Symmetry breaking by an electric condensate leads to magnetic confinement and vice-versa. We illustrate the general formalism with examples where the symmetry is broken by electric, magnetic and dyonic condensates.

hep-th↗

arXiv2002

Broken quantum symmetry and confinement phases in planar physics

Many two-dimensional physical systems have symmetries which are mathematically described by quantum groups (quasi-triangular Hopf algebras). In this letter we introduce the concept of a spontaneously broken Hopf symmetry and show that it provides an effective tool for analysing a wide variety of phases exhibiting many distinct confinement phenomena.

hep-th↗