Related papers: The toroidal block and the genus expansion
We extend earlier ideas about the appearance of noncommutative geometry in string theory with a nonzero B-field. We identify a limit in which the entire string dynamics is described by a minimally coupled (supersymmetric) gauge theory on a…
A modular tensor category provides the appropriate data for the construction of a three-dimensional topological field theory. We describe the following analogue for two-dimensional conformal field theories: a 2-category whose objects are…
In this paper, we explicitly construct string theory backgrounds that realise the so-called $\mathcal N=2^\star$ gauge theory. We prove the consistency of our models by calculating their partition function and obtaining the correct gauge…
We discuss in detail the $1+1$-dimensional superconformal field theory dual to type II string theory on $AdS_3\times S^3\times T^4$, emphasizing the string theoretic aspects of this duality. For one unit of NS-NS 5-brane flux ($Q_5=1$),…
We describe a topological string theory which reproduces many aspects of the 1/N expansion of SU(N) Yang-Mills theory in two spacetime dimensions in the zero coupling (A=0) limit. The string theory is a modified version of topological…
We study general perturbations of two-dimensional conformal field theories by holomorphic fields. It is shown that the genus one partition function is controlled by a contact term (pre-Lie) algebra given in terms of the operator product…
We study the AGT correspondence between four-dimensional supersymmetric gauge field theory and two-dimensional conformal field theories in the context of W_N minimal models. The origin of the AGT correspondence is in a special integrable…
We classify ${\cal N}=1$ gauge theories with simple gauge groups in four dimensions which possess a conformal manifold passing through weak coupling. A very rich variety of models is found once one allows for arbitrary representations under…
These lectures give an introduction to the novel duality relating type IIB string theory in a maximally supersymmetric plane-wave background to N=4, d=4, U(N) Super Yang-Mills theory in a particular large N and large R-charge limit due to…
This is the 12th article in the collection of reviews "Exact results on N=2 supersymmetric gauge theories" ed. J. Teschner. This article describes one way to understand an important part of the AGT-correspondence in terms of a triality…
We generalize, to any space-time dimension, the unitarity bounds of highest weight UIR's of the conformal groups with Lie algebras $so(2,d)$. We classify gauge theories invariant under $so(2,d)$, both integral and half-integral spins. A…
The anti-de Sitter/conformal field theory duality conjecture raises the question of how the perturbative expansion in the conformal field theory can resum to a simple function. We exhibit a relation between the one-loop and two-loop…
We study field theories in two spacetime dimensions invariant under a chiral scaling symmetry that acts only on right-movers. The local symmetries include one copy of the Virasoro algebra and a U(1) current algebra. This differs from the 2d…
We introduce a full set of rules to directly express all $M$-point conformal blocks in one- and two-dimensional conformal field theories, irrespective of the topology. The $M$-point conformal blocks are power series expansion in some…
We construct the genus two (or two loop) partition function for meromorphic bosonic conformal field theories. We use a sewing procedure involving two genus one tori by exploiting an explicit relationship between the genus two period matrix…
We summarize the results obtained in the last few years about permutation orbifolds in two-dimensional conformal field theories, their application to string theory and their use in the construction of four-dimensional heterotic string…
We consider M-theory in the presence of M parallel M5-branes probing a transverse A_{N-1} singularity. This leads to a superconformal theory with (1,0) supersymmetry in six dimensions. We compute the supersymmetric partition function of…
In these lectures, we review the main properties of the topological theory obtained by twisting the N=2 two-dimensional superconformal algebra, associated to supersymmetric string compactifications. In particular, we describe a set of…
We systematically study how the integrality of the conformal characters shapes the space of fermionic rational conformal field theories in two dimensions. The integrality suggests that conformal characters on torus with a given choice of…
We discover a modular property of supersymmetric partition functions of supersymmetric theories with R-symmetry in four dimensions. This modular property is, in a sense, the generalization of the modular invariance of the supersymmetric…