Charge screening in the Higgs phase of Chern-Simons electrodynamics

Abstract

Though screened at large distances, a point-like electric charge can still participate in a long-range electromagnetic interaction in the Higgs phase, namely that with the Aharonov-Bohm field produced by a localized magnetic flux. We show that this follows from the fact that the screening charge, induced in the presence of a Higgs condensate, does not interact with the Aharonov-Bohm field. The same phenomenon occurs, if a Chern-Simons term is incorporated in the action. This observation provides a physical basis for the recently proposed classification of the superselection sectors of this model in terms of a quasi-Hopf algebra.

9 pages, LATEX file, ITFA 93-05 and ITEP-M-1/93

References in corpus (6)

• Interaction of Discrete States in Two-Dimensional String Theory
• Quantum Field Theory of Nonabelian Strings and Vortices
• Quantum symmetries in discrete gauge theories
• String Representation of the Abelian Higgs Theory and Aharonov-Bohm Effect on the Lattice
• On Detecting Discrete Cheshire Charge
• Anyons in discrete gauge theories with Chern-Simons terms

Cited by in corpus (17)

• Non-Abelian Anyons and Topological Quantum Computation
• Resonance Scattering Phase Shifts on a Non-Rest Frame Lattice
• Condensate induced transitions between topologically ordered phases
• Hopf symmetry breaking and confinement in (2+1)-dimensional gauge theory
• Quantum Theory of Strings in Abelian Higgs Model
• Scattering phases on finite lattices in the broken phase of the four-dimensional O(4)-ϕ^4 theory
• Self Duality and Oblique Confinement in Planar Gauge Theories
• Spontaneously broken abelian Chern-Simons theories
• Quantumgroups in the Higgs Phase
• Dyon Condensation and Aharonov-Bohm Effect
• Confinement in partially broken abelian Chern-Simons theories
• Aharonov-Bohm Effect in Lattice Abelian Higgs Theory
• On the Need for Phenomenological Theory of P-Vortices or Does Spaghetti Confinement Pattern Admit Condensed-Matter Analogies?
• Confined Vortices in Topologically Massive U(1)$\times$U(1) Theory
• Aharonov-Bohm Order Parameters for Non-Abelian Gauge Theories
• Characterizing Topological Order in Superconducting Systems
• Towards Topological Quantum Computation? - Knotting and Fusing Flux Tubes