MS Seminar (Mathematics - String Theory)

Speaker: Michael Singer (U College London)
Title: Asymptotic geometry of monopole moduli space and the Sen Conjecture
Date (JST): Tue, Mar 27, 2018, 15:30 - 17:00
Place: Seminar Room B
Abstract: The moduli space of (non-abelian, euclidean, SU(2)) monopoles has been of interest to mathematicians and mathematical physicists since the mid-1980s. It was proved around that time that the natural L^2 metric is hyperKaehler and complete; and its role in low-energy dynamics of monopoles was extensively discussed and analyzed. After the advent of S-duality in supersymmetric gauge theories in the 1990s, Sen made a striking conjecture about the spectrum of supersymmetric quantum states on the monopole moduli spaces. From the mathematical point of view, Sen's conjectures are about the existence of L^2 harmonic forms on monopole moduli spaces and the analysis of this problem requires a good understanding of the monopole metric. I shall describe recent progress on this problem which will at least prove a part of Sen's conjectures. This is joint work with Karsten Fritzsch and Chris Kottke.