SEMINAR 2024

Abstract

Symmetries organize much of condensed matter physics and have historically characterized phases of matter. However, topological phases of matter challenged that paradigm, as they appear to be distinct phases of matter with the same symmetry. In this talk, I will describe how an increasing number of unusual physical phenomena can now be understood through the lens of symmetry, provided we are a little flexible with what symmetries we allow. Sometimes, we need to generalize what we mean by a “symmetry”; I will survey some new types of symmetry and give an example of how so-called multipolar symmetries can lead to extremely restricted, slow dynamics. Other times, new behaviors can arise from surprising behaviors of familiar symmetries; for example, I will show how translation symmetry, when it acts on anyons, can cause certain detailed microscopic properties of a model to affect supposedly universal properties of the model’s ground states.