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Excitons are the neutral quasiparticles that form when Coulomb interactions create bound states between electrons and holes. Due to their bosonic nature, excitons are expected to condense and exhibit superfluidity at sufficiently low temperatures. In interacting Chern insulators, excitons may inherit the nontrivial topology and quantum geometry from the underlying electron wavefunctions. We theoretically investigate the excitonic bound states and superfluidity in flat-band insulators pumped with light. We find that the exciton wavefunctions exhibit vortex structures in momentum space, with the total vorticity being equal to the difference of Chern numbers between the conduction and valence bands. Moreover, both the exciton binding energy and the exciton superfluid density are proportional to the Brillouin-zone average of the quantum metric and the Coulomb potential energy per unit cell. Spontaneous emission of circularly polarized light from radiative decay is a detectable signature of the exciton vorticity. We propose that the vorticity can also be experimentally measured via the nonlinear anomalous Hall effect, whereas the exciton superfluidity can be detected by voltage-drop quantization through a combination of quantum geometry and Aharonov-Casher effect. Topological excitons and their superfluid phase could be realized in flat bands of twisted Van der Waals heterostructures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Weyl semimetals resulting from either inversion (P) or time-reversal (T) symmetry breaking have been revealed to show the record-breaking large optical response due to intense Berry curvature of Weyl-node pairs. Different classes of Weyl semimetals with both P and T symmetry breaking potentially exhibit optical magnetoelectric (ME) responses, which are essentially distinct from the previously observed optical responses in conventional Weyl semimetals, leading to the versatile functions such as directional dependence for light propagation and gyrotropic effects. However, such optical ME phenomena of (semi)metallic systems have remained elusive so far. Here, we show the large nonlinear optical ME response in noncentrosymmetric magnetic Weyl semimetal PrAlGe, in which the polar structural asymmetry and ferromagnetic ordering break P and T symmetry. We observe the giant second harmonic generation (SHG) arising from the P symmetry breaking in the paramagnetic phase, being comparable to the largest SHG response reported in Weyl semimetal TaAs. In the ferromagnetically ordered phase, it is found that interference between this nonmagnetic SHG and the magnetically induced SHG emerging due to both P and T symmetry breaking results in the magnetic field switching of SHG intensity. Furthermore, such an interference effect critically depends on the light-propagating direction. The corresponding magnetically induced nonlinear susceptibility is significantly larger than the prototypical ME material, manifesting the existence of the strong nonlinear dynamical ME coupling. The present findings establish the unique optical functionality of P-and T-symmetry broken ME topological semimetals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A hyperlink is a finite set of non-intersecting simple closed curves in R 4 ≡ R × R 3 , and each curve is either a matter or geometric loop. We consider an equivalence class of such hyperlinks, up to time-like isotopy, preserving time-ordering. Using an equivalence class and after coloring each matter component loop with an irreducible representation of s u (2) × su (2) , we can define its Wilson loop observable using an Einstein–Hilbert action, which is now thought of as a functional acting on the set containing equivalence classes of hyperlink. Construct a vector space using these functionals, which we now term as quantum states. To make it into a Hilbert space, we need to define a counting probability measure on the space containing equivalence classes of hyperlinks. In our previous work, we defined area, volume and curvature operators, corresponding to given geometric objects like surface and a compact solid spatial region. These operators act on the quantum states and, by deliberate construction of the Hilbert space, are self-adjoint and possibly unbounded operators. Using these operators and Einstein's field equations, we can proceed to construct a quantized stress operator and also a Hamiltonian constraint operator for the quantum system. We will also use the area operator to derive the Bekenstein entropy of a black hole. In the concluding section, we will explain how loop quantum gravity predicts the existence of gravitons, implies causality and locality in quantum gravity and formulates the principle of equivalence mathematically in its framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quantum de Sitter geometry is discussed using elementary field operator algebras in Krein space quantization from an observer-independent point of view, i.e., ambient space formalism. In quantum geometry, the conformal sector of the metric becomes a dynamical degree of freedom, which can be written in terms of a massless minimally coupled scalar field. The elementary fields necessary for the construction of quantum geometry are introduced and classified. A complete Krein–Fock space structure for elementary fields is presented using field operator algebras. We conclude that since quantum de Sitter geometry can be constructed by elementary fields operators, the geometry quantum state is immersed in the Krein–Fock space and evolves in it. The total number of accessible quantum states in the universe is chosen as a parameter of quantum state evolution, which has a relationship with the universe's entropy. Inspired by the Wheeler–DeWitt constraint equation in cosmology, the evolution equation of the geometry quantum state is formulated in terms of the Lagrangian density of interaction fields in ambient space formalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bloch electrons in multiorbital systems carry quantum geometric information characteristic of their wavevector-dependent interorbital mixing. The geometric nature impacts electromagnetic responses, and this effect carries over to the superconducting state, which receives a geometric contribution to the superfluid weight. In this paper, we show that this contribution could become negative under certain appropriate circumstances. This may facilitate the stabilization of Cooper pairings with real space phase modulation, i.e., the pair density wave order, as we demonstrate through two-orbital model Bogoliubov de-Gennes mean-field calculations. The quantum geometric effect therefore constitutes an intrinsic mechanism for the formation of such a novel phase of matter in the absence of external magnetic field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quantum de Sitter geometry is discussed using elementary field operator algebras in Krein space quantization from an observer-independent point of view, i.e., ambient space formalism. In quantum geometry, the conformal sector of the metric becomes a dynamical degree of freedom, which can be written in terms of a massless minimally coupled scalar field. The elementary fields necessary for the construction of quantum geometry are introduced and classified. A complete Krein–Fock space structure for elementary fields is presented using field operator algebras. We conclude that since quantum de Sitter geometry can be constructed by elementary fields operators, the geometry quantum state is immersed in the Krein–Fock space and evolves in it. The total number of accessible quantum states in the universe is chosen as a parameter of quantum state evolution, which has a relationship with the universe’s entropy. Inspired by the Wheeler–DeWitt constraint equation in cosmology, the evolution equation of the geometry quantum state is formulated in terms of the Lagrangian density of interaction fields in ambient space formalism.

We discuss a new approach to the problem of quantum gravity in which the quantum mechanical structures that are traditionally fixed, such as the Fubini–Study metric in the Hilbert space of states, become dynamical and so implement the idea of gravitizing the quantum. In particular, in this formulation of quantum gravity the quantum geometry is still consistent with the principles of unitarity and also captures fundamental aspects of (quantum) gravity, such as topology change. Furthermore, we address specific ways of testing this new approach to quantum gravity by utilizing multipath interference and optical lattice atomic clocks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The spin geometry theorem of Penrose is extended from SU(2) to E(3) (Euclidean) invariant elementary quantum mechanical systems. Using the natural decomposition of the total angular momentum into its spin and orbital parts, the distance between the centre-of-mass lines of the elementary subsystems of a classical composite system can be recovered from their relative orbital angular momenta by E(3)-invariant classical observables. Motivated by this observation, an expression for the 'empirical distance' between the elementary subsystems of a composite quantum mechanical system, given in terms of E(3)-invariant quantum observables, is suggested. It is shown that, in the classical limit, this expression reproduces the a priori Euclidean distance between the subsystems, though at the quantum level it has a discrete character. 'Empirical' angles and 3-volume elements are also considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the traditional formalism of quantum mechanics, a simple direct proof of (a version of) the Spin Geometry Theorem of Penrose is given; and the structure of a model of the ‘space of the quantum directions’, defined in terms of elementary SU(2)-invariant observables of the quantum mechanical systems, is sketched. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Excitons are the neutral quasiparticles that form when Coulomb interactions create bound states between electrons and holes. Due to their bosonic nature, excitons are expected to condense and exhibit superfluidity at sufficiently low temperatures. In interacting Chern insulators, excitons may inherit the nontrivial topology and quantum geometry from the underlying electron wavefunctions. We theoretically investigate the excitonic bound states and superfluidity in flat-band insulators pumped with light. We find that the exciton wavefunctions exhibit vortex structures in momentum space, with the total vorticity being equal to the difference of Chern numbers between the conduction and valence bands. Moreover, both the exciton binding energy and the exciton superfluid density are proportional to the Brillouin-zone average of the quantum metric and the Coulomb potential energy per unit cell. Spontaneous emission of circularly polarized light from radiative decay is a detectable signature of the exciton vorticity. We propose that the vorticity can also be experimentally measured via the nonlinear anomalous Hall effect, whereas the exciton superfluidity can be detected by voltage-drop quantization through a combination of quantum geometry and Aharonov-Casher effect. Topological excitons and their superfluid phase could be realized in flat bands of twisted Van der Waals heterostructures., Competing Interests: Competing interests statement:The authors declare no competing interest.

We show that interlayer charge transfer in 2D materials can be driven by an in-plane electric field, giving rise to electrical multipole generation in linear and second order in-plane field. The linear and nonlinear effects have quantum geometric origins in the Berry curvature and quantum metric, respectively, defined in extended parameter spaces characteristic of layered materials. We elucidate their symmetry characters and demonstrate sizable dipole and quadrupole polarizations, respectively, in twisted bilayers and trilayers of transition metal dichalcogenides. Furthermore, we show that this effect is strongly enhanced during the topological phase transition tuned by interlayer translation. The effects point to a new electric control on the layer quantum degree of freedom.

Matrix configurations define noncommutative spaces endowed with extra structure including a generalized Laplace operator, and hence a metric structure. Made dynamical via matrix models, they describe rich physical systems including noncommutative gauge theory and emergent gravity. Refining the construction in [25] , we construct a semi-classical limit through an immersed submanifold of complex projective space based on quasi-coherent states. We observe the phenomenon of oxidation, where the resulting semi-classical space acquires spurious extra dimensions. We propose to remove this artifact by passing to a leaf of a carefully chosen foliation, which allows to extract the geometrical content of the noncommutative spaces. This is demonstrated numerically via multiple examples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We construct a Connes spectral triple or ‘Dirac operator’ on the non-reduced fuzzy sphere C λ [ S 2 ] as realised using quantum Riemannian geometry with a central quantum metric g of Euclidean signature and its associated quantum Levi-Civita connection. The Dirac operator is characterised uniquely up to unitary equivalence within our quantum Riemannian geometric setting and an assumption that the spinor bundle is trivial and rank 2 with a central basis. The spectral triple has KO dimension 3 and in the case of the round metric, essentially, recovers a previous proposal motivated by rotational symmetry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quantum geometric tensor, including a symmetric real part defined as quantum metric and an antisymmetric part defined as Berry curvature, is essential for understanding many phenomena. In this study, we investigated the photogalvanic effect of semiconductors with time-reversal-invariant and spatial inversion symmetries using the quantum kinetic equation. We concluded that the integral of the symmetric (antisymmetric) part of quantum geometric tensor on the equal energy surface in momentum space, satisfying the resonance condition, is related to the generation rate of carriers in semiconductors under linearly (circularly) polarized light. Under additional bias voltage, the dc photocurrent is proportional to the bias voltage. Our study provided an alternative interpretation for the photogalvanic effect in the view of quantum geometric tensor. Additionally, it classified the intrinsic difference between linearly and circularly polarized optical fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we reexamine the derivation of the dynamical equations of the Ashtekar-Olmedo-Singh black hole model in order to determine whether it is possible to construct a Hamiltonian formalism where the parameters that regulate the introduction of quantum geometry effects are treated as true constants of motion. After arguing that these parameters should capture contributions from two distinct sectors of the phase space that had been considered independent in previous analyses in the literature, we proceed to obtain the corresponding equations of motion and analyze the consequences of this more general choice. We restrict our discussion exclusively to these dynamical issues. We also investigate whether the proposed procedure can be reconciled with the results of Ashtekar, Olmedo, and Singh, at least in some appropriate limit.

[Display omitted] A centrally symmetric variant of Bohr's atomic model was constructed according to first geometric principles, and entanglement of pairs of subatomic particles through invariant rotations that stabilize the system. Its base symmetry was constrained to 2-fold rotational symmetry corresponding to 2 electrons associated with the atomic ground energy state. The theory was constructed using two sets of invariant rotations of distinguishable and indistinguishable type, derived from spherical approximations, with information regarding the initial state of the system preserved throughout the geometric transformation. Superposition of alternating structures of the two types indicates that closing of electron shells may take place via formation of mirror symmetry through rotational invariance, and quantization of energy can be reconciled with observables in quantum mechanics. The resulting solution correlates subshells s-g with unique parity-supporting states, and subsequent subshells with their imitations, having double the number of electrons of the preceding subshell of a corresponding type. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I will discuss some aspects of the concept of “point” in quantum gravity, using mainly the tool of noncommutative geometry. I will argue that at Planck’s distances the very concept of point may lose its meaning. I will then show how, using the spectral action and a high momenta expansion, the connections between points, as probed by boson propagators, vanish. This discussion follows closely (Kurkov, Lizzi and Vassilevich, 2014).

We study the quantum geometry of the fuzzy sphere defined as the angular momentum algebra [ x i , x j ] = 2 ı λ p ϵ ijk x k modulo setting ∑ i x i 2 to a constant, using a recently introduced 3D rotationally invariant differential structure. Metrics are given by symmetric 3 × 3 matrices g and we show that for each metric there is a unique quantum Levi-Civita connection with constant coefficients, with scalar curvature 1 2 (Tr (g 2) - 1 2 Tr (g) 2) / det (g) . As an application, we construct Euclidean quantum gravity on the fuzzy unit sphere. We also calculate the charge 1 monopole for the 3D differential structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In quantum geometry, we consider a set of loops, a compact orientable surface and a solid compact spatial region, all inside ℝ × ℝ3 = ℝ4, which forms a triple. We want to define an ambient isotopic equivalence relation on such triples, so that we can obtain equivalence invariants. These invariants describe how these submanifolds are causally related to or 'linked' with each other, and they are closely associated with the linking number between links in ℝ3. Because we distinguish the time-axis from spatial subspace in ℝ4, we see that these equivalence relations will also imply causality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Weyl semimetals resulting from either inversion ( P ) or time-reversal ( T ) symmetry breaking have been revealed to show the record-breaking large optical response due to intense Berry curvature of Weyl-node pairs. Different classes of Weyl semimetals with both P and T symmetry breaking potentially exhibit optical magnetoelectric (ME) responses, which are essentially distinct from the previously observed optical responses in conventional Weyl semimetals, leading to the versatile functions such as directional dependence for light propagation and gyrotropic effects. However, such optical ME phenomena of (semi)metallic systems have remained elusive so far. Here, we show the large nonlinear optical ME response in noncentrosymmetric magnetic Weyl semimetal PrAlGe, in which the polar structural asymmetry and ferromagnetic ordering break P and T symmetry. We observe the giant second harmonic generation (SHG) arising from the P symmetry breaking in the paramagnetic phase, being comparable to the largest SHG response reported in Weyl semimetal TaAs. In the ferromagnetically ordered phase, it is found that interference between this nonmagnetic SHG and the magnetically induced SHG emerging due to both P and T symmetry breaking results in the magnetic field switching of SHG intensity. Furthermore, such an interference effect critically depends on the light-propagating direction. The corresponding magnetically induced nonlinear susceptibility is significantly larger than the prototypical ME material, manifesting the existence of the strong nonlinear dynamical ME coupling. The present findings establish the unique optical functionality of P - and T -symmetry broken ME topological semimetals., Competing Interests: Competing interests statement:The authors declare no competing interest.

The asymptotic safety program builds on a high-energy completion of gravity based on the Reuter fixed point, a non-trivial fixed point of the gravitational renormalization group flow. At this fixed point the canonical mass-dimension of coupling constants is balanced by anomalous dimensions induced by quantum fluctuations such that the theory enjoys quantum scale invariance in the ultraviolet. The crucial role played by the quantum fluctuations suggests that the geometry associated with the fixed point exhibits non-manifold like properties. In this work, we continue the characterization of this geometry employing the composite operator formalism based on the effective average action. Explicitly, we give a relation between the anomalous dimensions of geometric operators on a background d-sphere and the stability matrix encoding the linearized renormalization group flow in the vicinity of the fixed point. The eigenvalue spectrum of the stability matrix is analyzed in detail and we identify a “perturbative regime” where the spectral properties are governed by canonical power counting. Our results recover the feature that quantum gravity fluctuations turn the (classically marginal) R2-operator into a relevant one. Moreover, we find strong indications that higher-order curvature terms present in the two-point function play a crucial role in guaranteeing the predictive power of the Reuter fixed point.

Geometry and topology are fundamental concepts, which underlie a wide range of fascinating physical phenomena such as topological states of matter and topological defects. In quantum mechanics, the geometry of quantum states is fully captured by the quantum geometric tensor. Using a qubit formed by an NV center in diamond, we perform the first experimental measurement of the complete quantum geometric tensor. Our approach builds on a strong connection between coherent Rabi oscillations upon parametric modulations and the quantum geometry of the underlying states. We then apply our method to a system of two interacting qubits, by exploiting the coupling between the NV center spin and a neighboring 13C nuclear spin. Our results establish coherent dynamical responses as a versatile probe for quantum geometry, and they pave the way for the detection of novel topological phenomena in solid state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work is meant as a review summary of a series of recent results concerning the derivation of a holographic entanglement entropy formula for generic open spin network states in the group field theory (GFT) approach to quantum gravity. The statistical group-field computation of the Rényi entropy for a bipartite network state for a simple interacting GFT is reviewed, within a recently proposed dictionary between group field theories and random tensor networks, and with an emphasis on the problem of a consistent characterisation of the entanglement entropy in the GFT second quantisation formalism.

We review inflationary cosmology in modified gravity such as R2 gravity with its extensions in order to generalize the Starobinsky inflation model. In particular, we explore inflation realized by three kinds of effects: modification of gravity, the quantum anomaly, and the R2 term in loop quantum cosmology. It is explicitly demonstrated that in these inflationary models, the spectral index of scalar modes of the density perturbations and the tensor-to-scalar ratio can be consistent with the Planck results. Bounce cosmology in F(R) gravity is also explained.

Flat bands can be divided into singular and non-singular ones according to the behavior of their Bloch wave function around band-crossing points in momentum space. We analyze the flat band in the Dice model, which can be tuned by a uniaxial strain in the zigzag direction and a Haldane-type next-nearest neighbor interaction, and derive the topological phase diagram of the modified Haldane-Dice model to obtain all band-gap closings with the central band. When the central band is flat, we determine its compact localized state and classify its behavior at all band-touching points by means of the Hilbert–Schmidt quantum distance. We find that the flat band remains singular for all band-touching points (topological phase transitions) with a maximal quantum distance and give expressions for the resulting non-contractible loop states on the real-space torus. • Topological phase diagram of the Haldane-Dice model modified by uniaxial strain. • Analysis of the quantum geometric properties flat band eigenstates around band-crossing points. • Linear dependence of the compact localized eigenstates of the flat band on a real-space torus. • Completion of set of all compact localized eigenstates by non-contractible loop states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]