Independent e- and m-Anyon Confinement in the Parallel Field Toric Code on Non-Square Lattices

Kitaev’s toric code has become one of the most studied models in physics and is highly relevant to the fields of both quantum error correction and condensed matter physics. Most notably, it is the simplest known model hosting an extended, deconfined topological bulk phase. To this day, it remains challenging to reliably and robustly probe topological phases, as many state-of-the-art order parameters are sensitive to specific models and even specific parameter regimes. With the emergence of powerful quantum simulators which are approaching the regimes of topological bulk phases, there is a timely need for experimentally accessible order parameters. Here we study the ground state physics of the parallel field toric code on the honeycomb, triangular, and cubic lattices using continuous-time quantum Monte Carlo. By extending the concept of experimentally accessible percolation-inspired order parameters (POPs) we show that electric and magnetic anyons are independently confined on the honeycomb and triangular lattices, unlike on the square lattice. Our work manifestly demonstrates that, even in the ground state, we must make a distinction between topological order and (de-)confinement. Moreover, we report multicritical points in the aforementioned confinement phase diagrams. Finally, we map out the topological phase diagrams on the honeycomb, triangular, and cubic lattices and compare the performance of the POPs with other topological order parameters. Our work paves the way for studies of confinement involving dynamical matter and the associated multicritical points in contemporary quantum simulation platforms for <a:math xmlns:a="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"> <a:msub> <a:mrow> <a:mi mathvariant="double-struck">Z</a:mi> </a:mrow> <a:mn>2</a:mn> </a:msub> </a:math> lattice gauge theories.