Related papers: Coherent span-valued 2D TQFTs

We construct a cohomology theory for oriented links using singular cobordisms and a special type of 2-dimensional Topological Quantum Field Theory (TQFT), categorifying the quantum sl(2) invariant. In particular, we give a description of…

The notion of 2-framed three-manifolds is defined. The category of 2-framed cobordisms is described, and used to define a 2-framed three-dimensional TQFT. Using skeletonization and special features of this category, a small set of data and…

This paper contains three related groupings of results. First, we consider a new notion of an admissible skein module of a surface associated to an ideal in a (non-semisimple) pivotal category. Second, we introduce the notion of a chromatic…

We give another definition of two-dimensional extended homotopy field theories (E-HFTs) with aspherical targets and classify them. When the target of E-HFT is chosen to be a $K(G,1)$-space, we classify E-HFTs taking values in the symmetric…

We show that if $M$ is a Frobenius manifold of dimension $n$ such that $T_{x} M$ is semisimple for every $x \in M$, then there exists a canonical 2-vector bundle $\mathcal{B}$ over $M$ of rank $n$. This 2-vector bundle encodes the…

We construct two-dimensional non-commutative topological quantum field theories (TQFTs), one for each Hecke algebra corresponding to a finite Coxeter system. These TQFTs associate an invariant to each ciliated surface, which is a Laurent…

We construct a category equivalent to the category $\mathbf{Mon}$ of monoids and monoid homomorphisms, based on categories with strict factorization systems. This equivalence is then extended to the category $\mathbf{Mon_s}$ of unital…

We introduce a class of potential submanifolds in pseudo-Euclidean spaces (each N-dimensional potential submanifold is a special flat torsionless submanifold in a 2N-dimensional pseudo-Euclidean space) and prove that each N-dimensional…

We construct and study a new family of TQFTs based on nilpotent highest weight representations of quantum sl(2) at a root of unity indexed by generic complex numbers. This extends to cobordisms the non-semi-simple invariants defined in…

The goal of this work is to describe a categorical formalism for (Extended) Topological Quantum Field Theories (TQFTs) and present them as functors from a suitable category of cobordisms with corners to a linear category, generalizing 2d…

We construct a ring structure on complex cobordism tensored with the rationals, which is related to the usual ring structure as quantum cohomology is related to ordinary cohomology. The resulting object defines a generalized two-…

This paper proves three different coherence theorems for symmetric monoidal bicategories. First, we show that in a free symmetric monoidal bicategory every diagram of 2-cells commutes. Second, we show that this implies that the free…

We construct a certain `cobordism category' ${\cal D}$ whose morphisms are suitably decorated cobordism classes between similarly decorated closed oriented 1-manifolds, and show that there is essentially a bijection between…

This is the Ph.D. dissertation of the author. The project has been motivated by the conjecture that the Hopkins-Miller tmf spectrum can be described in terms of `spaces' of conformal field theories. In this dissertation, spaces of field…

In 2001, S. Barannikov showed that the Frobenius manifold coming from the quantum cohomology of the complex projective space is isomorphic to the Frobenius manifold attached to some Laurent polynomial. The purpose of this thesis is to…

We propose a new mwthod of constructing 4D-TQFTs. The method uses a new type of algebraic structure called a Hopf Category. We also outline the construction of a family of Hopf categories related to the quantum groups, using the canonical…

Certain aspects of Street's formal theory of monads in 2-categories are extended to multimonoidal monads in symmetric strict monoidal 2-categories. Namely, any symmetric strict monoidal 2-category $\mathcal M$ admits a symmetric strict…

We define a tensor product for permutative categories and prove a number of key properties. We show that this product makes the 2-category of permutative categories closed symmetric monoidal as a bicategory.

We study Quillen model categories equipped with a monoidal skew closed structure that descends to a genuine monoidal closed structure on the homotopy category. Our examples are 2-categorical and include permutative categories and…

We begin with a brief sketch of what is known and conjectured concerning braided monoidal 2-categories and their applications to 4d topological quantum field theories and 2-tangles (surfaces embedded in 4-dimensional space). Then we give…