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PreprintCC BY 4.0arXiv

Bosonic SPT and invertible phases and its relation to Steenrod's problem

  • Shota Saito
  • Yuji Tachikawa
  • Yi Zhang
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Abstract

Bosonic invertible and symmetry-protected topological (SPT) phases are well-known to be described by ordinary cohomology groups in low dimensions, but `beyond-cohomology' phases appear in higher dimensions. We make a systematic study of them, and find that the first major non-triviality is a mod-3 phenomenon, and not a mod-2 phenomenon as in the case of fermionic phases. We also point out that this is a dual manifestation of the classic question of Steenrod, namely the issue of the existence of homology cycles without manifold representatives. Thom developed the theory of cobordisms to answer this question, and we explain how the same analysis leads to Dijkgraaf-Witten phases which are nontrivial on general simplicial complexes but become trivial on manifolds.

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Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@misc{saito2026bosonic,
  title = {{Bosonic SPT and invertible phases and its relation to Steenrod's problem}},
  author = {Shota Saito and Yuji Tachikawa and Yi Zhang},
  howpublished = {arXiv},
  year = {2026},
  month = sep,
  doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2607.14662},
  eprint = {2607.14662},
  archivePrefix = {arXiv},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.14662},
  note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY  - UNPB
TI  - Bosonic SPT and invertible phases and its relation to Steenrod's problem
AU  - Shota Saito
AU  - Yuji Tachikawa
AU  - Yi Zhang
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/09/10
PB  - arXiv
DO  - 10.48550/arxiv.2607.14662
UR  - https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.14662
AB  - Bosonic invertible and symmetry-protected topological (SPT) phases are well-known to be described by ordinary cohomology groups in low dimensions, but `beyond-cohomology' phases appear in higher dimensions. We make a systematic study of them, and find that the first major non-triviality is a mod-3 phenomenon, and not a mod-2 phenomenon as in the case of fermionic phases. We also point out that this is a dual manifestation of the classic question of Steenrod, namely the issue of the existence of homology cycles without manifold representatives. Thom developed the theory of cobordisms to answer this question, and we explain how the same analysis leads to Dijkgraaf-Witten phases which are nontrivial on general simplicial complexes but become trivial on manifolds.
ER  -