TopoPhys, SS 13

Meetings:

Thursdays, 4:40PM-6:10PM, Seminar room 1, MPIPKS

Lecturers:

Roderich Moessner [moessner(at)pks.mpg.de]
Frank Pollmann [frankp(at)pks.mpg.de]

Outline:

Introduction:

1. Landau-theory of symmetry breaking
2. Kosterlitz-Thouless transitions

Quantum-Hall effect:

1. Integer quantum Hall effect
2. Fractional quantum Hall effect

Topological Insulators and superconductors:

1. 1D Majorana chains
2. Quantum Hall without magnetic field (Haldane model)
3. 2D quantum topological Hall insulator
4. 3D quantum topological Hall insulator
5. Experimental signatures

Topological order and fractionalization:

1. 1D Polyacetylene
2. Topological spin liquids
3. Exactly solvable models: toric code
4. Gauge theories and string net models
5. Anyons and topological quantum computing

No lectures on May 9 (Ascension Day), May 23 (Pentecost holidays)

Literature

Quantum Field Theory of Many-Body Systems, X.-G. Wen, Oxford Graduate Text
Lecture notes by John Preskill: http://www.theory.caltech.edu/~preskill/ph219/topological.pdf
Lecture notes by Alexei Kitaev and Chris Laumann: http://arxiv.org/pdf/0904.2771v1.pdf
Review article by Chetan Nayak et al.:http://arxiv.org/pdf/0707.1889v2.pdf