  Anyons have recently received great attention due to their promising
application in topological quantum computation. The best validated system that
enjoys the anyonic excitations are the Laughlin states. The quasi-particles in
Laughlin states are neither fermions nor bosons but possess the discrete
statistical angle ? = ?=m, with m being an integer. Here we report a possible
realization of the universal Abelian anyons, whose statistical angle can be
tuned continuously by external parameters and can take any arbitrary values
interpolating ? = 0 and ? = ?. The proposed setup is the surface state of a
three dimensional topological insulator driven by an amplitude-modulated
circularly-polarized light. It is found that the external field leads to a
particular Floquet phase, which is a two-spatial-dimensional analogy of the
Weyl semimetal phase in the Floquet first Brillouin zone. The chiral anomaly of
this phase results in a U(1) Chern-Simons gauge theory with a tunable Floquet
Chern number. Owing to this underlying gauge field theory, the irradiated
surface of topological insulator constitutes a promising platform for the
observation of the universal anyons.

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics