Reflection positivity and invertible topological phases

Abstract

We implement an extended version of reflection positivity (Wick-rotated unitarity) for invertible topological quantum field theories and compute the abelian group of deformation classes using stable homotopy theory. We apply these field theory considerations to lattice systems, assuming the existence and validity of low energy effective field theory approximations, and thereby produce a general formula for the group of Symmetry Protected Topological (SPT) phases in terms of Thom's bordism spectra; the only input is the dimension and symmetry group. We provide computations for fermionic systems in physically relevant dimensions. Other topics include symmetry in quantum field theories, a relativistic 10-fold way, the homotopy theory of relativistic free fermions, and a topological spin-statistics theorem.Comment: 136 pages, 16 figures; minor changes/corrections in version 2; v3 major revision; v4 minor revision: corrected proof of Lemma 9.55, many small changes throughout; v5 version for publication in Geometry & Topolog