Non-Abelian Topological Order in S-Wave Superfluids of Ultracold Fermionic Atoms

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that s-wave superfluids of ultracold fermionic atoms with laser-induced spin-orbit coupling can host non-Abelian topological phases featuring Majorana quasiparticles, advancing quantum computation prospects.

Contribution

It introduces a method to realize non-Abelian topological order in s-wave superfluids using laser-generated spin-orbit interactions and Zeeman fields, enabling potential quantum computing applications.

Findings

Topological phase with gapless edge states identified

Majorana fermions obeying non-Abelian statistics realized

Feasible approach for quantum computation using ultracold atoms

Abstract

We show that in s-wave superfluids of cold fermionic atoms with laser-field-generated effective spin-orbit interactions, a topological phase with gapless edge states and Majorana fermion quasiparticles obeying the non-Abelian statistics is realized in the case with a large Zeeman magnetic field. Our scenario provides a promising approach for quantum computation manipulating non-Abelian anyons via an s-wave Feshbach resonance.