Speaker: Thomas Dumitrescu (UCLA)
Title: Symmetry Breaking from Monopoles in 3d QED
Abstract: QED in 2+1 spacetime dimensions arises in many physical settings; it is strongly interacting, and as such a foil for the more complicated dynamics of non-Abelian gauge theories. In this talk I will review what is known about this theory as a function of the number of charged Dirac electrons. I will then explain new results about the theory with the smallest number of electrons, which is the least well understood. The theory spontaneously breaks its symmetries via conventional fermion-bilinear order parameters as well as monopole operators, in a coordinated fashion. Anomaly matching leads to an interesting theta-term in the resulting non-linear sigma model for the Nambu-Goldstone bosons. Time permitting, I will comment on a version of the theory with non-compact gauge group.