Title: The Left Hand of the Electron in a Chiral Vacuum
Abstract: In 1957, parity violation by the weak force was demonstrated in experiments led by Chien-Shiung Wu on the asymmetry of electron currents emitted in the beta decay of polarized 60Co. The asymmetry reflects two broken symmetries that mirror reflection and time-reversal.
The same year, Bardeen, Cooper and Schrieffer published their microscopic theory of superconductivity, and soon thereafter Anderson and Morel proposed that the ground-state of liquid 3He was possibly a BCS condensate of chiral p-wave Cooper pairs, exhibiting spontaneously broken mirror reflection and time-reversal symmetries.
Indeed, the high-pressure phase of superfluid 3He, discovered in 1972, is the realization of the Anderson-Morel state.Definitive proof that 3He-A spontaneously breaks mirror and time-reversal symmetry, however, came 41 years later with the observation an anomalous Hall effect for electrons moving in 3He-A. I discuss the prediction, discovery and origin of the anomalous Hall current of electrons moving in a chiral vacuum.