Not to be confused with anion, a negatively charged ion.

For the American

educationalist, see Jean Anyon.
Statistical mechanics
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In physics, an anyon is a type of quasiparticle that occurs only in two-dimensional

systems, with properties much less restricted than fermions and bosons. In general,
the operation of exchanging two identical particles may cause a global phase shift
but cannot affect observables. Anyons are generally classified as abelian or non-
abelian. Abelian anyons have been detected and play a major role in the fractional
quantum Hall effect. Non-abelian anyons have not been definitively detected,
although this is an active area of research.
Contents

1 Abelian anyons
1.1 Topological equivalence
1.2 Experiment
2 Non-abelian anyons
3 Fusion of anyons
4 Topological basis
5 Higher dimensional generalization of anyons
6 See also
7 References
8 Further reading

Abelian anyons

In quantum mechanics, there can exist indistinguishable particles. Unlike in

classical mechanics, where each particle is labeled by a distinct state vector ψ i
{\displaystyle \psi _{i}} \psi_i, and different configurations of the set of ψ i
{\displaystyle \psi _{i}} \psi_is correspond to different many-body states, in
quantum mechanics, the particles are identical, such that exchanging the states of
two particles, i.e. ψ i ↔ ψ j {\displaystyle \psi _{i}\leftrightarrow \psi _{j}}
{\displaystyle \psi _{i}\leftrightarrow \psi _{j}}, does not lead to a measurably
different many-body quantum state.

For example, a system with two indistinguishable particles, with particle 1 in

state ψ1 and particle 2 in state ψ2, has state (in Dirac notation) | ψ 1 ψ 2 ⟩
{\displaystyle \left|\psi _{1}\psi _{2}\right\rangle } {\displaystyle \left|\psi
_{1}\psi _{2}\right\rangle }. Now suppose we exchange the states of the two
particles, then the state of the system would be | ψ 2 ψ 1 ⟩ {\displaystyle
\left|\psi _{2}\psi _{1}\right\rangle } {\displaystyle \left|\psi _{2}\psi
_{1}\right\rangle }. These two states should not have a measurable difference, so
they should be the same vector, up to a phase factor:

| ψ 1 ψ 2 ⟩ = e i θ | ψ 2 ψ 1 ⟩ . {\displaystyle \left|\psi _{1}\psi

_{2}\right\rangle =e^{i\theta }\left|\psi _{2}\psi _{1}\right\rangle .}
{\displaystyle \left|\psi _{1}\psi _{2}\right\rangle =e^{i\theta }\left|\psi
_{2}\psi _{1}\right\rangle .}

In space of three or more dimensions, elementary particles are either fermions or

bosons, according to their statistical behaviour. Fermions obey Fermi–Dirac
statistics, while bosons obey Bose–Einstein statistics. For bosons, the phase
factor is 1 {\displaystyle 1} 1, and for fermions, it is − 1 {\displaystyle -1} -1.
In particular, this is why fermions obey Pauli exclusion principle: If two fermions
are in the same state, then we have

| ψ ψ ⟩ = − | ψ ψ ⟩ . {\displaystyle \left|\psi \psi \right\rangle =-\left|\psi

\psi \right\rangle .} {\displaystyle \left|\psi \psi \right\rangle =-\left|\psi
\psi \right\rangle .}

The state vector must be zero, which means it's not normalizable, thus unphysical.

In two-dimensional systems, however, quasiparticles can be observed that obey

statistics ranging continuously between Fermi–Dirac and Bose–Einstein statistics,
as was first shown by Jon Magne Leinaas and Jan Myrheim of the University of Oslo
in 1977.[1] In the case of two particles this can be expressed as

| ψ 1 ψ 2 ⟩ = e i θ | ψ 2 ψ 1 ⟩ , {\displaystyle \left|\psi _{1}\psi

_{2}\right\rangle =e^{i\theta }\left|\psi _{2}\psi _{1}\right\rangle ,}
{\displaystyle \left|\psi _{1}\psi _{2}\right\rangle =e^{i\theta }\left|\psi
_{2}\psi _{1}\right\rangle ,}

where e i θ {\displaystyle e^{i\theta }} e^{i\theta } can be other values than just

− 1 {\displaystyle -1} -1 or 1 {\displaystyle 1} 1. It is important to note that
there is a slight abuse of notation in this shorthand expression, as in reality
this wave function can be and usually is multi-valued. This expression actually
means that when particle 1 and particle 2 are interchanged in a process where each
of them makes a counterclockwise half-revolution about the other, the two-particle
system returns to its original quantum wave function except multiplied by the
complex unit-norm phase factor eiθ. Conversely, a clockwise half-revolution results
in multiplying the wave function by e−iθ. Such a theory obviously only makes sense
in two-dimensions, where clockwise and counterclockwise are clearly defined
directions.

In the case θ = π we recover the Fermi–Dirac statistics (eiπ = −1) and in the case
θ = 0 (or θ = 2π) the Bose–Einstein statistics (e2πi = 1). In between we have
something different. Frank Wilczek coined the term "anyon"[2] to describe such
particles, since they can have any phase when particles are interchanged. Unlike
bosons and fermions, anyons have the peculiar property that when they are
interchanged twice in the same way (e.g. if anyon 1 and anyon 2 were revolved
counterclockwise by half revolution about each other to switch places, and then
they were revolved counterclockwise by half revolution about each other again to go
back to their original places), the wave function is not necessarily the same but
rather generally multiplied by some complex phase (by e2iθ in this example).

We may also use θ = 2π s with particle spin quantum number s, with s being integer
for bosons, half-integer for fermions, so that

e i θ = e 2 i π s = ( − 1 ) 2 s , {\displaystyle e^{i\theta }=e^{2i\pi s}=(-

1)^{2s},} {\displaystyle e^{i\theta }=e^{2i\pi s}=(-1)^{2s},} or | ψ 1 ψ 2 ⟩ =
( − 1 ) 2 s | ψ 2 ψ 1 ⟩ . {\displaystyle \left|\psi _{1}\psi _{2}\right\rangle =(-
1)^{2s}\left|\psi _{2}\psi _{1}\right\rangle .} {\displaystyle \left|\psi _{1}\psi
_{2}\right\rangle =(-1)^{2s}\left|\psi _{2}\psi _{1}\right\rangle .}

At an edge, fractional quantum Hall effect anyons are confined to move in one space
dimension. Mathematical models of one-dimensional anyons provide a base of the
commutation relations shown above.

In a three-dimensional position space, the fermion and boson statistics operators

(−1 and +1 respectively) are just 1-dimensional representations of the permutation
group (SN of N indistinguishable particles) acting on the space of wave functions.
In the same way, in two-dimensional position space, the abelian anyonic statistics
operators (eiθ) are just 1-dimensional representations of the braid group (BN of N
indistinguishable particles) acting on the space of wave functions. Non-abelian
anyonic statistics are higher-dimensional representations of the braid group.
Anyonic statistics must not be confused with parastatistics, which describes
statistics of particles whose wavefunctions are higher-dimensional representations
of the permutation group.