Tell me more ×
Physics Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for active researchers, academics and students of physics. It's 100% free, no registration required.
up vote 4 down vote favorite

I've read that the Jordan-Wigner transformation changes qubits into spinless fermions. What, exactly, are spinless fermions? I'm guessing it doesn't mean spin zero which would be a boson, so what does it mean?

share|improve this question

1 Answer

up vote 4 down vote accepted

It is only in relativistic quantum field theory that spin and statistics are connected; see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spin-statistics_theorem

In non-relativistic QFT the two are completely distinct. Spin manifests as local degrees of freedom, and statistics is encoded in the (anti-)commutation relations at equal times.

share|improve this answer
1  
Plea for help: does anyone have a self-contained (online) reference to CCR and CAR? The Wikipedia page on this is needlessly pedantic for a beginner (i.e. considering the exponentiated forms to make them compact --- I doubt the OP much cares for compactness). – genneth Oct 11 '11 at 13:18
Thanks @genneth, so does that mean spinless does mean spin zero? – Calvin Oct 11 '11 at 15:58
1  
You can treat it as spin zero, but only if you don't take that to mean anything more than just a lack of local degrees if freedom. For instance, it says nothing about angular momentum. – genneth Oct 11 '11 at 18:02

Your Answer

 
discard

By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.