Anomalies in Superfluids and a Chiral Electric Effect

TL;DR

This paper explores chiral transport phenomena in relativistic superfluids, revealing a chiral electric conductivity linked to anomalies and extending previous theoretical frameworks to systems with multiple symmetries.

Contribution

It introduces a generalized framework for chiral transport in superfluids with multiple symmetries and proposes a link between chiral electric conductivity and gravitational anomalies.

Findings

Identification of chiral electric conductivity in superfluids.

Extension of chiral transport theory to multiple symmetries.

Proposal linking transport coefficients to triangle anomalies.

Abstract

We analyze the chiral transport terms in relativistic superfluid hydrodynamics. In addition to the spontaneously broken symmetry current, we consider an arbitrary number of unbroken symmetries and extend the results of arXiv:1105.3733. We suggest an interpretation of some of the new transport coefficients in terms of chiral and gravitational anomalies. In particular, we show that with unbroken gauged charges in the system, one can observe a chiral electric conductivity - a current in a perpendicular direction to the applied electric field. We present a motivated proposal for the value of the associated transport coefficient, linking it to the triangle anomaly. Along the way we present new arguments regarding the interpretation of the anomalous transport coefficients in normal fluids. We propose a natural generalization of the chiral transport terms to the case of an arbitrary number of spontaneously broken symmetry currents.