An important challenge in the field of many-body quantum dynamics is to identify non-ergodic states of matter beyond many-body localization (MBL). Strongly disordered spin chains with non-Abelian symmetry and chains of non-Abelian anyons are natural
candidates, as they are incompatible with standard MBL. In such chains, real space renormalization group methods predict a partially localized, non-ergodic regime known as a quantum critical glass (a critical variant of MBL). This regime features a tree-like hierarchy of integrals of motion and symmetric eigenstates with entanglement entropy that scales as a logarithmically enhanced area law. We argue that such tentative non-ergodic states are perturbatively unstable using an analytic computation of the scaling of off-diagonal matrix elements and accessible level spacing of local perturbations. Our results indicate that strongly disordered chains with non-Abelian symmetry display either spontaneous symmetry breaking or ergodic thermal behavior at long times. We identify the relevant length and time scales for thermalization: even if such chains eventually thermalize, they can exhibit non-ergodic dynamics up to parametrically long time scales with a non-analytic dependence on disorder strength.
Dimer models have long been a fruitful playground for understanding topological physics. Here we introduce a new class - termed Majorana-dimer models - wherein bosonic dimers are decorated with pairs of Majorana modes. We find that the simplest examp
les of such systems realize an intriguing, intrinsically fermionic phase of matter that can be viewed as the product of a chiral Ising theory, which hosts deconfined non-Abelian quasiparticles, and a topological $p_x - ip_y$ superconductor. While the bulk anyons are described by a single copy of the Ising theory, the edge remains fully gapped. Consequently, this phase can arise in exactly solvable, frustration-free models. We describe two parent Hamiltonians: one generalizes the well-known dimer model on the triangular lattice, while the other is most naturally understood as a model of decorated fluctuating loops on a honeycomb lattice. Using modular transformations, we show that the ground-state manifold of the latter model unambiguously exhibits all properties of the $text{Ising} times (p_x-ip_y)$ theory. We also discuss generalizations with more than one Majorana mode per site, which realize phases related to Kitaevs 16-fold way in a similar fashion.
Strongly correlated analogues of topological insulators have been explored in systems with purely on-site symmetries, such as time-reversal or charge conservation. Here, we use recently developed tensor network tools to study a quantum state of inter
acting bosons which is featureless in the bulk, but distinguished from an atomic insulator in that it exhibits entanglement which is protected by its spatial symmetries. These properties are encoded in a model many-body wavefunction that describes a fully symmetric insulator of bosons on the honeycomb lattice at half filling per site. While the resulting integer unit cell filling allows the state to bypass `no-go theorems that trigger fractionalization at fractional filling, it nevertheless has nontrivial entanglement, protected by symmetry. We demonstrate this by computing the boundary entanglement spectra, finding a gapless entanglement edge described by a conformal field theory as well as degeneracies protected by the non-trivial action of combined charge-conservation and spatial symmetries on the edge. Here, the tight-binding representation of the space group symmetries plays a particular role in allowing certain entanglement cuts that are not allowed on other lattices of the same symmetry, suggesting that the lattice representation can serve as an additional symmetry ingredient in protecting an interacting topological phase. Our results extend to a related insulating state of electrons, with short-ranged entanglement and no band insulator analogue.
