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Surgery calculus for classical $\operatorname{SL}_2(\mathbb{C})$ Chern-Simons theory

Geometric Topology 2022-10-19 v1 Quantum Algebra

Abstract

Classical SL2(C)\operatorname{SL}_2(\mathbb{C})-Chern-Simons theory assigns a 33-manifold MM with representation ρ:π1(M)SL2(C)\rho : \pi_1(M) \to \operatorname{SL}_2(\mathbb{C}) its complex volume V(M,ρ)C/2π2iZ\operatorname{V}(M, \rho) \in \mathbb{C} / 2 \pi^2 i \mathbb{Z}, with real part the volume and imaginary part the Chern-Simons invariant. The existing literature focuses on computing V\operatorname{V} using a triangulation. In this paper we show how to compute V(M,L,ρ)\operatorname{V}(M, L, \rho) directly from a surgery diagram for MM a compact oriented 33-manifold with torus boundary components, embedded cusps LL, and representation ρ:π1(ML)SL2(C)\rho : \pi_1(M \setminus L) \to \operatorname{SL}_2(\mathbb{C}). When MM has nonempty boundary V(M,L,ρ)(s)\operatorname{V}(M, L, \rho)(\mathfrak{s}) depends on some extra data s\mathfrak{s} we call a log-decoration. Our method describes ρ\rho in a coordinate system closely related to quantum groups, and we think of our construction as a classical, noncompact version of Witten-Reshetikhin-Turaev's quantum SU(2)\operatorname{SU}(2) Chern-Simons theory.

Cite

@article{arxiv.2210.09469,
  title  = {Surgery calculus for classical $\operatorname{SL}_2(\mathbb{C})$ Chern-Simons theory},
  author = {Calvin McPhail-Snyder},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2210.09469},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

34 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-28T03:52:17.020Z