1991/12/19 by John March-Russell, John Preskill, Frank Wilczek · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #Quantum and electron transport phenomena #Quantum chaos and dynamical systems #Quantum, superfluid, helium dynamics #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.68.2567
published as Phys.Rev.Lett. 68 (1992) 2567-2571 · (14 pp)
arxiv created 1991/12/19 · openalex publication_date 1992/04/27 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
It is shown that the breakdown of a global symmetry group to a discrete subgroup can lead to analogs of the Aharonov-Bohm effect. At sufficiently low momentum transfer, the cross section for scattering of a particle with nontrivial Z2 charge off a global vortex is almost equal to (but definitely different from) maximal Aharonov-Bohm scattering; the effect goes away at large momentum transfer. The scattering of a spin-1/2 particle off a magnetic vortex provides an amusing experimentally realizable example.