No Arabic abstract
BPS quivers for N=2 SU(N) gauge theories are derived via geometric engineering from derived categories of toric Calabi-Yau threefolds. While the outcome is in agreement of previous low energy constructions, the geometric approach leads to several new results. An absence of walls conjecture is formulated for all values of N, relating the field theory BPS spectrum to large radius D-brane bound states. Supporting evidence is presented as explicit computations of BPS degeneracies in some examples. These computations also prove the existence of BPS states of arbitrarily high spin and infinitely many marginal stability walls at weak coupling. Moreover, framed quiver models for framed BPS states are naturally derived from this formalism, as well as a mathematical formulation of framed and unframed BPS degeneracies in terms of motivic and cohomological Donaldson-Thomas invariants. We verify the conjectured absence of BPS states with exotic SU(2)_R quantum numbers using motivic DT invariants. This application is based in particular on a complete recursive algorithm which determine the unframed BPS spectrum at any point on the Coulomb branch in terms of noncommutative Donaldson-Thomas invariants for framed quiver representations.
We provide a semiclassical description of framed BPS states in four-dimensional N = 2 super Yang-Mills theories probed by t Hooft defects, in terms of a supersymmetric quantum mechanics on the moduli space of singular monopoles. Framed BPS states, like their ordinary counterparts in the theory without defects, are associated with the L^2 kernel of certain Dirac operators on moduli space, or equivalently with the L^2 cohomology of related Dolbeault operators. The Dirac/Dolbeault operators depend on two Cartan-valued Higgs vevs. We conjecture a map between these vevs and the Seiberg-Witten special coordinates, consistent with a one-loop analysis and checked in examples. The map incorporates all perturbative and nonperturbative corrections that are relevant for the semiclassical construction of BPS states, over a suitably defined weak coupling regime of the Coulomb branch. We use this map to translate wall crossing formulae and the no-exotics theorem to statements about the Dirac/Dolbeault operators. The no-exotics theorem, concerning the absence of nontrivial SU(2)_R representations in the BPS spectrum, implies that the kernel of the Dirac operator is chiral, and further translates into a statement that all L^2 cohomology of the Dolbeault operator is concentrated in the middle degree. Wall crossing formulae lead to detailed predictions for where the Dirac operators fail to be Fredholm and how their kernels jump. We explore these predictions in nontrivial examples. This paper explains the background and arguments behind the results announced in a short accompanying note.
Type IIA on the conifold is a prototype example for engineering QED with one charged hypermultiplet. The geometry admits a flop of length one. In this paper, we study the next generation of geometric engineering on singular geometries, namely flops of length two such as Laufers example, which we affectionately think of as the $it{conifold 2.0}$. Type IIA on the latter geometry gives QED with higher-charge states. In type IIB, even a single D3-probe gives rise to a nonabelian quiver gauge theory. We study this class of geometries explicitly by leveraging their quiver description, showing how to parametrize the exceptional curve, how to see the flop transition, and how to find the noncompact divisors intersecting the curve. With a view towards F-theory applications, we show how these divisors contribute to the enhancement of the Mordell-Weil group of the local elliptic fibration defined by Laufers example.
The elliptic genus of K3 is an index for the 1/4-BPS states of its sigma model. At the torus orbifold point there is an accidental degeneracy of such states. We blow up the orbifold fixed points using conformal perturbation theory, and find that this fully lifts the accidental degeneracy of the 1/4-BPS states with h=1. At a generic point near the Kummer surface the elliptic genus thus measures not just their index, but counts the actual number of these BPS states. We comment on the implication of this for symmetry surfing and Mathieu moonshine.
Inspired by the split attractor flow conjecture for multi-centered black hole solutions in N=2 supergravity, we propose a formula expressing the BPS index $Omega(gamma,z)$ in terms of `attractor indices $Omega_*(gamma_i)$. The latter count BPS states in their respective attractor chamber. This formula expresses the index as a sum over stable flow trees weighted by products of attractor indices. We show how to compute the contribution of each tree directly in terms of asymptotic data, without having to integrate the attractor flow explicitly. Furthermore, we derive new representations for the index which make it manifest that discontinuities associated to distinct trees cancel in the sum, leaving only the discontinuities consistent with wall-crossing. We apply these results in the context of quiver quantum mechanics, providing a new way of computing the Betti numbers of quiver moduli spaces, and compare them with the Coulomb branch formula, clarifying the relation between attractor and single-centered indices.
F-theory compactifications on appropriate local elliptic Calabi-Yau manifolds engineer six dimensional superconformal field theories and their mass deformations. The partition function $Z_{top}$ of the refined topological string on these geometries captures the particle BPS spectrum of this class of theories compactified on a circle. Organizing $Z_{top}$ in terms of contributions $Z_beta$ at base degree $beta$ of the elliptic fibration, we find that these, up to a multiplier system, are meromorphic Jacobi forms of weight zero with modular parameter the Kaehler class of the elliptic fiber and elliptic parameters the couplings and mass parameters. The indices with regard to the multiple elliptic parameters are fixed by the refined holomorphic anomaly equations, which we show to be completely determined from knowledge of the chiral anomaly of the corresponding SCFT. We express $Z_beta$ as a quotient of weak Jacobi forms, with a universal denominator inspired by its pole structure as suggested by the form of $Z_{top}$ in terms of 5d BPS numbers. The numerator is determined by modularity up to a finite number of coefficients, which we prove to be fixed uniquely by imposing vanishing conditions on 5d BPS numbers as boundary conditions. We demonstrate the feasibility of our approach with many examples, in particular solving the E-string and M-string theories including mass deformations, as well as theories constructed as chains of these. We make contact with previous work by showing that spurious singularities are cancelled when the partition function is written in the form advocated here. Finally, we use the BPS invariants of the E-string thus obtained to test a generalization of the Goettsche-Nakajima-Yoshioka $K$-theoretic blowup equation, as inspired by the Grassi-Hatsuda-Marino conjecture, to generic local Calabi-Yau threefolds.