Mirror Symmetry and Discriminants


Abstract in English

We analyze the locus, together with multiplicities, of bad conformal field theories in the compactified moduli space of N=(2,2) superconformal field theories in the context of the generalization of the Batyrev mirror construction using the gauged linear sigma-model. We find this discriminant of singular theories is described beautifully by the GKZ A-determinant but only if we use a noncompact toric Calabi-Yau variety on the A-model side and logarithmic coordinates on the B-model side. The two are related by local mirror symmetry. The corresponding statement for the compact case requires changing multiplicities in the GKZ determinant. We then describe a natural structure for monodromies around components of this discriminant in terms of spherical functors. This can be considered a categorification of the GKZ A-determinant. Each component of the discriminant is naturally associated with a category of massless D-branes.

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