Z2Z_2 Topological Order and the Quantum Spin Hall Effect

The quantum spin Hall (QSH) phase is a time reversal invariant electronic state with a bulk electronic band gap that supports the transport of charge and spin in gapless edge states. We show that this phase is associated with a novel $Z_2$ topological invariant, which distinguishes it from an ordinary insulator. The $Z_2$ classification, which is defined for time reversal invariant Hamiltonians, is analogous to the Chern number classification of the quantum Hall effect. We establish the $Z_2$ order of the QSH phase in the two band model of graphene and propose a generalization of the formalism applicable to multi band and interacting systems.Comment: 4 pages RevTeX. Added reference, minor correction

A path integral derivation of χy\chi_y-genus

The formula for the Hirzebruch $\chi_y$-genus of complex manifolds is a consequence of the Hirzebruch-Riemann-Roch formula. The classical index formulae for Todd genus, Euler number, and Signature correspond to the case when the complex variable $y=$ 0, -1, and 1 respectively. Here we give a {\it direct} derivation of this nice formula based on supersymmetric quantum mechanics.Comment: 5 page

The Index Theorem and Universality Properties of the Low-lying Eigenvalues of Improved Staggered Quarks

We study various improved staggered quark Dirac operators on quenched gluon backgrounds in lattice QCD generated using a Symanzik-improved gluon action. We find a clear separation of the spectrum into would-be zero modes and others. The number of would-be zero modes depends on the topological charge as expected from the Index Theorem, and their chirality expectation value is large (approximately 0.7). The remaining modes have low chirality and show clear signs of clustering into quartets and approaching the random matrix theory predictions for all topological charge sectors. We conclude that improvement of the fermionic and gauge actions moves the staggered quarks closer to the continuum limit where they respond correctly to QCD topology.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

New Implications of Lorentz Violation

In this proceedings, I summarize two recently discovered theoretical implications that Lorentz violation has on physical systems. First, I discuss new models for neutrino oscillations in which relatively simple combinations of Lorentz-violating parameters can mimic the major features of the current neutrino oscillation data. Second, I will present results on Yang-Mills instantons in Lorentz-violating background fields. An explicit solution is presented for unit winding number in SU(2).Comment: 8 pages, proceedings for 2003 Coral Gables Conference, Ft. Lauderdale, F

Multi-Periodic Coherent States and the WKB-Exactness

We construct the path integral formula in terms of ``multi-periodic'' coherent state as an extension of the Nielsen-Rohrlich formula for spin. We make an exact calculation of the formula and show that, when a parameter corresponding to the magnitude of spin becomes large, the leading order term of the expansion coincides with the exact result. We also give an explicit correspondence between the trace formula in the multi-periodic coherent state and the one in the ``generalized'' coherent state.Comment: 28 pages, late

Multi-Periodic Coherent States and the WKB-Exactness II ``Non-compact Case and Classical theories Revisited''

We show that the WKB approximation gives the exact result in the trace formula of ``$CQ^N$'', which is the non-compact counterpart of $CP^N$, in terms of the ``multi-periodic'' coherent state. We revisit the symplectic 2-forms on $CP^N$ and $CQ^N$ and, especially, construct that on $CQ^N$ with the unitary form. We also revisit the exact calculation of the classical patition functions of them.Comment: LaTeX, 29 page

Instanton Moduli and Topological Soliton Dynamics

It has been proposed by Atiyah and Manton that the dynamics of Skyrmions may be approximated by motion on a finite dimensional manifold obtained from the moduli space of SU(2) Yang-Mills instantons. Motivated by this work we describe how similar results exist for other soliton and instanton systems. We describe in detail two examples for the approximation of the infinite dimensional dynamics of sine-Gordon solitons by finite dimensional dynamics on a manifold obtained from instanton moduli. In the first example we use the moduli space of CP1 instantons and in the second example we use the moduli space of SU(2) Yang-Mills instantons. The metric and potential functions on these manifolds are constructed and the resulting dynamics is compared with the explicit exact soliton solutions of the sine-Gordon theory.Comment: uuencoded tex file, 27 pages including 4 figures, requires phyzzx macro. DAMTP 94-5

A Newman-Penrose Calculator for Instanton Metrics

We present a Maple11+GRTensorII based symbolic calculator for instanton metrics using Newman-Penrose formalism. Gravitational instantons are exact solutions of Einstein's vacuum field equations with Euclidean signature. The Newman-Penrose formalism, which supplies a toolbox for studying the exact solutions of Einstein's field equations, was adopted to the instanton case and our code translates it for the computational use.Comment: 13 pages. Matches the published version. The web page of the codes is changed as https://github.com/tbirkandan/NPInstanto

Consistent 3D Quantum Gravity on Lens Spaces

We study non-perturbative quantization of 3d gravity with positive cosmological constant (de Sitter space being the prototype vacuum solution, whose Euclideanization of course gives the three sphere) on the background topology of lens space, which is a three spheres modulo a discrete group. Instead of the strategy followed by a recent work \cite{Castro:2011xb}, which compares results in the second and first order formulations of gravity, we concentrate on the later solely. We note, as a striking feature, that the quantization, that relies heavily on the axiomatics of topological quantum field theory (TQFT) can only be consistently carried by augmenting the conventional theory by an additional topological term coupled through a dimensionless parameter. More importantly the introduction of this additional parameter renders the theory finite.Comment: New section and references added. Accepted in Phys. Rev. D for publicatio