Phase structure of Abelian Chern-Simons gauge theories

Abstract

We study the effect of a Chern-Simons (CS) term in the phasestructure of two different Abelian gauge theories. For thecompact Maxwell-Chern-Simons theory, with the CS term properlydefined, we obtain that for values g = n/2π of the CS couplingwith n = ±1, ±2, the theory is equivalent to a gas ofclosed loops with contact interaction, exhibiting a phasetransition in the 3dXY universality class. We also employ MonteCarlo simulations to study the noncompact U(1) Abelian Higgsmodel with a CS term. Finite-size scaling of the third moment ofthe action yields critical exponents α and ν that varycontinuously with the strength of the CS term, and a comparisonwith available analytical results is made.