Topological Nematic States and Non-Abelian Lattice Dislocations

An exciting new prospect in condensed matter physics is the possibility of realizing fractional quantum Hall states in simple lattice models without a large external magnetic field. A fundamental question is whether qualitatively new states can be realized on the lattice as compared with ordinary fractional quantum Hall states. Here we propose new symmetry-enriched topological states, topological nematic states, which are a dramatic consequence of the interplay between the lattice translational symmetry and topological properties of these fractional Chern insulators. The topological nematic states are realized in a partially filled flat band with a Chern number N, which can be mapped to an N-layer quantum Hall system on a regular lattice. However, in the topological nematic states the lattice dislocations can act as wormholes connecting the different layers and effectively change the topology of the space. Consequently, lattice dislocations become defects with a nontrivial quantum dimension, even when the fractional quantum Hall state being realized is, by itself, Abelian. Our proposal leads to the possibility of realizing the physics of topologically ordered states on high-genus surfaces in the lab even though the sample has only the disk geometry.