Searching for exotic ground states of quantum many-body systems. What's out there?

Tuesday, September 28, 2010 – 3:15pm
Reiss 502
Gregory Fiete
University of Texas at Austin

In this talk we will highlight the some of the recent advances made in the theory of “exotic” phases of quantum many-body systems and comment on the state of their experimental realization. In particular we will discuss topological insulators and quantum spin liquids as two key examples of exotic states. We will explain why they are “exotic”, suggest how they may be useful in applications, and speculate on what lies ahead in this exciting frontier of physics research.

Host: Jim Freericks