Classical Chern-Simons theory, Part 1

A gauge system is a classical field theory where among the fields there are connections in a principal G-bundle over the space-time manifold and the classical action is either invariant or transforms appropriately with respect to the action of the gauge group. The lectures are focused on the path integral quantization of such systems. Here two main examples of gauge systems are Yang-Mills and Chern-Simons.

The Chern-Simons (CS) form evolved from an obstruction in mathematics into an important object in theoretical physics. In fact, the presence of CS terms in physics is more common than one may think: they seem to play an important role in high Tc superconductivity and in recently discovered topological insulators. In classical physics, the minimal coupling in electromagnetism and to the action for a mechanical system in Hamiltonian form are examples of CS functionals. CS forms...

Let M be a U(1) bundle over a smooth Riemann surface. I show that for Chern-Simons theory on M, with structure group G, the path integral is an integral over the space of G-connections on the Riemann surface involving characteristic classes as well as a certain 4-dimensional class that comes from a universal bundle. When M is the product of a Riemann surface with a circle the 4-dimensional class does not enter and the path integral takes the form of a Riemann-Roch formula alb...

Developing ideas based on combinatorial formulas for characteristic classes we introduce the algebra modeling secondary characteristic classes associated to $N$ connections. Certain elements of the algebra correspond to the ordinary and secondary characteristic classes.That construction allows us to give easily the explicit formulas for some known secondary classes and to construct the new ones. We write how $i$-th differential and $i$-th homotopy operator in the algebra are ...

We give a construction of the abelian Chern-Simons gauge theory from the point of view of a 2+1 dimensional topological quantum field theory. The definition of the quantum theory relies on geometric quantization ideas which have been previously explored in connection to the nonabelian Chern-Simons theory [JW,ADW]. We formulate the topological quantum field theory in terms of the category of extended 2- and 3-manifolds introduced by Walker [Wa] and prove that it satisfies the ...

Using the formalism of discrete quantum group gauge theory, one can construct the quantum algebras of observables for the Hamiltonian Chern-Simons model. The resulting moduli algebras provide quantizations of the algebra of functions on the moduli spaces of flat connections on a punctured 2-dimensional surface. In this note we describe some features of these moduli algebras with special emphasis on the natural action of mapping class groups. This leads, in particular, to a cl...

To understand what does Chern-Simons with compact Lie group(does not like Dijkgraaf-Witten model with finite group in 3d) attach to a point, we first give a construction of Topological Quantum Field Theory(TQFT) via Chern-Simons theory in this paper. We discuss the Topological Quantum Field Theory and Chern-Simons theory via Category, then interpret the cobordism as cospan and field of space-time as span, which ultimately deduce the construction of TQFT.

We use recent progress on Chern-Simons gauge theory in three dimensions [18] to give explicit, closed form formulas for the star product on some functions on the affine space ${\mathcal A}(\Sigma)$ of (smooth) connections on the trivialized principal $G$-bundle on a compact, oriented two manifold $\Sigma.$ These formulas give a close relation between knot invariants, such as the Kauffman bracket polynomial, and the Jones and HOMFLY polynomials, arising in Chern Simons gauge t...

% A new, formal, non-combinatorial approach to invariants of % three-dimensional manifolds of Reshetikhin, Turaev and % Witten in the framework of non-perturbative topological % quantum Chern-Simons theory, corresponding to an arbitrary % compact simple Lie group, is presented. A direct % implementation of surgery instructions in the context of % quantum field theory is proposed. An explicit form of the % specialization of the invariant to the group SU(2) is % derived, and sh...

The first part of this text is a gentle exposition of some basic constructions and results in the extended prequantum theory of Chern-Simons-type gauge field theories. We explain in some detail how the action functional of ordinary 3d Chern-Simons theory is naturally localized ("extended", "multi-tiered") to a map on the universal moduli stack of principal connections, a map that itself modulates a circle-principal 3-connection on that moduli stack, and how the iterated trans...