Non-abelian vortices on surfaces and their statistics Original Research Article

We discuss the physics of topological vortices moving on an arbitrary surface M in a YangMills-Higgs theory in which the gauge group G breaks to a finite subgroup H. We concentrate on the case where M is compact and/or non-orientable. Interesting new features arise which have no analog on the plane. The consequences for the quantum statistics of vortices are discussed, particularly when H is non-abelian.