Topological quantum states in condensed matter physics: chiral superfluids

TYPEColloquium
Speaker:Prof. William Halperin
Affiliation:Northwestern University
Date:30.03.2015
Time:14:30
Location:Lidow Rosen Auditorium (323)
Abstract:

 


New chiral states of 3He have recently been studied at Northwestern and are similarly thought to exist in a number of superconducting compounds, like UPt3 and Sr2RuO4.    In the past few years or more, the condensed matter physics community has become enamored of manifestations of long range coherence in these superconductors and superfluids, driven in part from predictions for their potential application to quantum computation.   I will focus on physical properties which are a consequence of chiral symmetry, most clearly in evidence in UPt3 and superfluid 3He.  These systems have multiple thermodynamic phases, each with a different order parameter structure.  My discussion of them will be a guided tour of search and discovery.