From Bopp Shifts to Toroidal Shadows: K-Theoretic Gap Labels in Noncommutative Quantum Mechanics

Abstract

We study Bopp shifts in two-dimensional noncommutative quantum mechanics (NCQM) through a functorial lens. A nondegenerate NCQM sector with central character $(\hbar,\vartheta,B_{\rm in})$ determines a self-adjoint infinitesimal representation of the NCQM Lie algebra $\mathfrak{g}_{\rm NC}$. A Darboux normalization of its represented phase-space operators produces a self-adjoint infinitesimal representation of the Weyl-Heisenberg Lie algebra $\mathfrak{g}_{\rm WH}$ with central parameter $\hbar$, and hence defines a Bopp-shift functor collapsing $(\hbar,\vartheta,B_{\rm in}) \mapsto \hbar$. In particular, a generic NCQM sector is not equivalent, as a $\mathfrak{g}_{\rm NC}$-sector, to the ordinary QM sector $(\hbar,0,0)$, even though their Bopp-shift images have the same Weyl-Heisenberg parameter. To measure what this collapse forgets, we construct a toroidal shadow functor assigning to each periodic datum $L=(a_x,a_y)$ and each NCQM sector $χ$ a phase-space noncommutative four-torus $A^4_{Θ_{χ,L}}$. Its $K_0$-trace pairing yields sector-sensitive gap labels whose top-degree coefficient is $(\vartheta B_{\rm in}-\hbar)/((2π)^2\hbar)$. This coefficient is independent of the spatial cell area $a_xa_y$ and equals the Pfaffian ${\rm Pf}(Θ_{χ,L})$, the top-degree generator of the $K_0$-trace range. Since strong Morita equivalence preserves this trace range up to positive scaling, non-proportionality of the trace ranges obstructs Morita equivalence of the shadows, separating equal-$\hbar$ sectors that the Bopp-shift functor identifies. In the arithmetic subfamily where $\vartheta/A$ and $B_{\rm in}A/\hbar$ are algebraic, the trace-range scale is forced to be trivial and $|{\rm Pf}|$ becomes a computable separation criterion: $|\vartheta B_{\rm in}-\hbar| \neq |\vartheta' B'_{\rm in}-\hbar|$ already implies inequivalence.