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Geometry-Topology Seminar

Thursday, October 24, 2019 - 4:30pm

Effie Kalfagianni

Michigan State University and IAS

Location

University of Pennsylvania

DRL 4C8

There will be two talks in this seminar sponsored jointly with Bryn Mawr and Haverford Colleges and Temple University. The first talk will be at 4:30 PM and the second at 5:45 PM. There will be a dinner afterwards.

The generalization of the Jones polynomial for links and 3-manifolds, due to Witten-Reshetikin-Turaev in the late 90’s, led to constructions of Topological Quantum Field Theory in dimensions (2+1).  These theories also include representations of surface mapping class groups.  The question of how much of the Thurston geometric picture of 3-manifolds is reflected in these theories is open.  I will report on recent work in this direction with emphasis on the corresponding  mapping class group representations.
The talk is based on joint work with R. Detcherry  and G. Belletti, R. Detcherry, T. Yang.