B Model Gromov Witten Theory

This book collects various perspectives, contributed by both mathematicians and physicists, on the B-model and its role in mirror symmetry. Mirror symmetry is an active topic of research in both the mathematics and physics communities, but among mathematicians, the “A-model” half of the story remains much better-understood than the B-model. This book aims to address that imbalance. It begins with an overview of several methods by which mirrors have been constructed, and from there, gives a thorough account of the “BCOV” B-model theory from a physical perspective; this includes the appearance of such phenomena as the holomorphic anomaly equation and connections to number theory via modularity. Following a mathematical exposition of the subject of quantization, the remainder of the book is devoted to the B-model from a mathematician’s point-of-view, including such topics as polyvector fields and primitive forms, Givental’s ancestor potential, and integrable systems.

Gromov-Witten theory started as an attempt to provide a rigorous mathematical foundation for the so-called A-model topological string theory of Calabi-Yau varieties. Even though it can be defined for all the Kähler/symplectic manifolds, the theory on Calabi-Yau varieties remains the most difficult one. In fact, a great deal of techniques were developed for non-Calabi-Yau varieties during the last twenty years. These techniques have only limited bearing on the Calabi-Yau cases. In a certain sense, Calabi-Yau cases are very special too. There are two outstanding problems for the Gromov-Witten theory of Calabi-Yau varieties and they are the focus of our investigation.

Global CY-B-model and quasi-modular forms -- Global Landau-Ginzburg B-model at genus zero -- Opposite subspaces -- Quantization and Fock bundle -- Mirror symmetry for orbifold Fermat CY hypersurfaces -- Mirror symmetry for Fermat CY singularities.

This volume is a collection of articles on orbifolds, algebraic curves with higher spin structures, and related invariants of Gromov-Witten type. Orbifold Gromov-Witten theory generalizes quantum cohomology for orbifolds, whereas spin cohomological field theory is based on the moduli spaces of higher spin curves and is related by Witten's conjecture to the Gelfand-Dickey integrable hierarchies. A common feature of these two very different looking theories is the central role played by orbicurves in both of them. Insights in one theory can often yield insights into the other. This book brings together for the first time papers related to both sides of this interaction. The articles in the collection cover diverse topics, such as geometry and topology of orbifolds, cohomological field theories, orbifold Gromov-Witten theory, $G$-Frobenius algebra and singularities, Frobenius manifolds and Givental's quantization formalism, moduli of higher spin curves and spin cohomological field theory.

This volume contains the proceedings of the 2016 AMS von Neumann Symposium on Topological Recursion and its Influence in Analysis, Geometry, and Topology, which was held from July 4–8, 2016, at the Hilton Charlotte University Place, Charlotte, North Carolina. The papers contained in the volume present a snapshot of rapid and rich developments in the emerging research field known as topological recursion. It has its origin around 2004 in random matrix theory and also in Mirzakhani's work on the volume of moduli spaces of hyperbolic surfaces. Topological recursion has played a fundamental role in connecting seemingly unrelated areas of mathematics such as matrix models, enumeration of Hurwitz numbers and Grothendieck's dessins d'enfants, Gromov-Witten invariants, the A-polynomials and colored polynomial invariants of knots, WKB analysis, and quantization of Hitchin moduli spaces. In addition to establishing these topics, the volume includes survey papers on the most recent key accomplishments: discovery of the unexpected relation to semi-simple cohomological field theories and a solution to the remodeling conjecture. It also provides a glimpse into the future research direction; for example, connections with the Airy structures, modular functors, Hurwitz-Frobenius manifolds, and ELSV-type formulas.

This volume contains the proceedings of the workshop Crossing the Walls in Enumerative Geometry, held in May 2018 at Snowbird, Utah. It features a collection of both expository and research articles about mirror symmetry, quantized singularity theory (FJRW theory), and the gauged linear sigma model. Most of the expository works are based on introductory lecture series given at the workshop and provide an approachable introduction for graduate students to some fundamental topics in mirror symmetry and singularity theory, including quasimaps, localization, the gauged linear sigma model (GLSM), virtual classes, cosection localization, $p$-fields, and Saito's primitive forms. These articles help readers bridge the gap from the standard graduate curriculum in algebraic geometry to exciting cutting-edge research in the field. The volume also contains several research articles by leading researchers, showcasing new developments in the field.

"This book is a testimony to the BIRS Workshop, and it covers a wide range of topics at the interface of number theory and string theory, with special emphasis on modular forms and string duality. They include the recent advances as well as introductory expositions on various aspects of modular forms, motives, differential equations, conformal field theory, topological strings and Gromov-Witten invariants, mirror symmetry, and homological mirror symmetry. The contributions are roughly divided into three categories: arithmetic and modular forms, geometric and differential equations, and physics and string theory. The book is suitable for researchers working at the interface of number theory and string theory."--BOOK JACKET.

The algebraic geometry community has a tradition of running a summer research institute every ten years. During these influential meetings a large number of mathematicians from around the world convene to overview the developments of the past decade and to outline the most fundamental and far-reaching problems for the next. The meeting is preceded by a Bootcamp aimed at graduate students and young researchers. This volume collects ten surveys that grew out of the Bootcamp, held July 6–10, 2015, at University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah. These papers give succinct and thorough introductions to some of the most important and exciting developments in algebraic geometry in the last decade. Included are descriptions of the striking advances in the Minimal Model Program, moduli spaces, derived categories, Bridgeland stability, motivic homotopy theory, methods in characteristic and Hodge theory. Surveys contain many examples, exercises and open problems, which will make this volume an invaluable and enduring resource for researchers looking for new directions.