Chern-Simons Field Theory invariants and Topological Strings

by Ramadevi Pichai (IIT, Bombay)

Tuesday 17 Jun 2008, 14:00 → 15:00 Europe/Zurich

TH Theory Conference Room (CERN)

We will present the role of Chern-Simons field theory as a theory describing three-dimensional manifolds, knots and links. Our attempts at solving a challenging problem: `classification of knots and links' will be highlighted. In the spirit of AdS-CFT, Gopakumar-Vafa conjectured that the Chern-Simons field theory on a three-sphere is dual to $A$ model closed topological string theory on a resolved conifold. After briefly reviewing the works of Gopakumar-Vafa and Ooguri-Vafa, we will present $U(N)$ Chern-Simons free energy expansion at large $N$ for many three-manifolds.