Fractional statistics is one of the most intriguing features of topological phases in 2D. In particular, the so-called non-Abelian statistics plays a crucial role towards realizing universal topological quantum computation. Recently, the study of topological phases has been extended to 3D and it has been proposed that loop-like extensive objects can also carry fractional statistics. In this work, we systematically study the so-called three-loop braiding statistics for loop-like excitations for 3D fermionic topological phases. Most surprisingly, we discovered new types of non-Abelian three-loop braiding statistics that can only be realized in fermionic systems (or equivalently bosonic systems with fermionic particles). The simplest example of such non-Abelian braiding statistics can be realized in interacting fermionic systems with a gauge group Z2×Z8 or Z4×Z4, and the physical origin of non-Abelian statistics can be viewed as attaching an open Majorana chain onto a pair of linked loops, which will naturally reduce to the well known Ising non-Abelian statistics via the standard dimension reduction scheme. Moreover, due to the correspondence between gauge theories with fermionic particles and classifying fermionic symmetry-protected topological (FSPT) phases with unitary symmetries, our study also give rise to an alternative way to classify FSPT phases with unitary symmetries. We further compare the classification results for FSPT phases with arbitrary Abelian total symmetry G^f and find systematical agreement with previous studies using other methods. We believe that the proposed framework of understanding three-loop braiding statistics (including both Abelian and non-Abelian cases) in interacting fermion systems applies for generic fermonic topological phases in 3D.

This paper is mainly inspired by the conjecture about the existence of bound states for magnetic Neumann Laplacians on planar wedges of any aperture <i></i> (0, <i></i>). So far, a proof was only obtained for apertures <i></i> 0.511. The conviction in the validity of this conjecture for apertures <i></i> 0.511<i></i> mainly relied on numerical computations. In this paper we succeed to prove the existence of bound states for any aperture <i></i> 0.583 using a variational argument with suitably chosen test functions. Employing some more involved test functions and combining a variational argument with computer assistance, we extend this interval up to any aperture <i></i> 0.595<i></i>. Moreover, we analyse the same question for closely related problems concerning magnetic Robin Laplacians on wedges and for magnetic Schrdinger operators in the plane with <i></i>-interactions supported on broken lines.

In this sequel to [L-Y1],[LLSY], and [L-Y2](respectively arXiv: 0709.1515 [math. AG], arXiv: 0809.2121 [math. AG], and arXiv: 0901.0342 [math. AG]), we study a D-brane probe on a conifold from the viewpoint of the Azumaya structure on D-branes and toric geometry. The details of how deformations and resolutions of the standard toric conifold Y can be obtained via morphisms from Azumaya points are given. This should be compared with the quantum-field-theoretic/D-brany picture of deformations and resolutions of a conifold via a D-brane probe sitting at the conifold singularity in the work of Klebanov and Witten [KW](arXiv: hep-th/9807080) and Klebanov and Strasser [KS](arXiv: hep-th/0007191). A comparison with resolutions via noncommutative desingularizations is given in the end.

We consider for <i>j</i>=, a spherically symmetric, static system of (2<i>j</i>+1) Dirac particles, each having total angular momentum <i>j</i>. The Dirac particles interact via a classical gravitational and electromagnetic field.

New heterotic torsional geometries are constructed as orbifolds of T^ 2 bundles over K3. The discrete symmetries considered can be freely-acting or have fixed points and/or fixed curves. We give explicit constructions when the base K3 is Kummer or algebraic. The orbifold geometries can preserve N= 1, 2 supersymmetry in four dimensions or be non-supersymmetric.