Quantum field theory and four-manifolds: Perspectives from physics and geometry

Abstract

These lecture notes are based on lecture series by the authors for the Summer School 2025 on ``Physical mathematics of quantum field theory" at the University of Massachusetts Amherst organized by Owen Gwilliam, Chris Elliott, and Matteo Lotito. The lectures centred around algebraic structures arising from twists of supersymmetric quantum field theories, correlation functions of topologically twisted supersymmetric gauge theories, and their mathematical counterparts as intersection-theoretic invariants associated to moduli spaces of instantons, semistable sheaves, or Higgs sheaves on four-manifolds or complex projective surfaces.

arXiv comment138 pages