Hilbert space fragmentation, zero modes, and strong ETH breaking in an anyonic chain, Dr. Nico Kirchner, Technical University of Munich

Tuesday 26 May 2026, 11:00 → 13:00 Asia/Taipei

R620 (NTHU)

The eigenstate thermalization hypothesis (ETH) provides a general paradigm for understanding the thermalization behavior of generic isolated quantum many-body systems, and its violation is subject to current research. In this talk, we go beyond the usual bosonic and fermionic cases and study a chain of non-Abelian Fibonacci anyons subject to braiding in a magnetic field. For this model, braiding-induced destructive interference results in an exponential number of dynamically disconnected subspaces, giving rise to (weak) Hilbert space fragmentation and violation of ETH. Each of these subspaces is associated with a conserved sublattice pattern in real space and further hosts zero modes. Moreover, the system is shown to strongly violate ETH using infinite temperature connected correlators that converge to finite, nonzero values in the thermodynamic limit.