Computing defects associated to bounded domain wall structures: the Z/pZ case
We discuss domain walls and defects in topological phases occurring as the Drinfeld center of some fusion category. Domain walls between such phases correspond to bimodules between the fusion categories. Point defects correspond to functors between the bimodules. A domain wall structure consists of a planar graph with faces labeled by fusion categories. Edges are labeled by bimodules. When the vertices are labeled by point defects we get a compound defect. We present an algorithm, called the domain wall structure algorithm, for computing the compound defect. We apply this algorithm to show that the bimodule associator, related to the O3 obstruction of Etingof et al (2010 Quantum Topol. 1 209), is trivial for all domain walls of VecZ/pZ. In the language of this paper, the ground states of the Levin–Wen model are compound defects. We use this to define a generalization of the Levin–Wen model with domain walls and point defects. The domain wall structure algorithm can be used to compute the ground states of these generalized Levin–Wen type models.