Non-Hermitian effects of the intrinsic signs in topologically ordered wavefunctions

Abstract

Negative signs in many-body wavefunctions play an important role in quantum mechanics. The ground-state wavefunction of double semion model on a two-dimensional hexagonal lattice contains an intrinsic sign which cannot be removed by any local transformation. Here we proposed a generic double semion wavefunction in tensor network representation, and the wavefunction norm is mapped to the partition function of a triangular lattice Ashkin-Teller model with imaginary magnetic fields and imaginary three-spin triangular face interactions. To solve this non-Hermitian model with parity-time (PT) symmetry, numerical tensor-network methods are employed, and a global phase diagram is determined. Adjacent to the double semion phase, we find a gapless dense loop phase described by non-unitary conformal field theory and a PT-symmetry breaking phase with zeros of the partition function. So a connection has established between the intrinsic signs in the topologically ordered wavefunction and the PT-symmetric non-Hermitian statistical model.