BRAID STATISTICS IN LOCAL QUANTUM THEORY

Abstract

We present details of a mathematical theory of superselection sectors and their statistics in local quantum theory over (two- and) three-dimensional space-time. The framework for our analysis is algebraic quantum field theory. Statistics of superselection sectors in three-dimensional local quantum theory with charges not localizable in bounded space-time regions and in two-dimensional chiral theories is described in terms of unitary representations of the braid groups generated by certain Yang-Baxter matrices. We describe the beginnings of a systematic classification of those representations. Our analysis makes contact with the classification theory of subfactors initiated by Jones. We prove a general theorem on the connection between spin and statistics in theories with braid statistics. We also show that every theory with braid statistics gives rise to a “Verlinde algebra”. It determines a projective representation of SL(2, ℤ) and, presumably, of the mapping class group of any Riemann surface, even if the theory does not display conformal symmetry.