Tag - Topology

Hoang Kim Nguyen: Contravariant homotopy theories and Quillen’s Theorem A

29th April, 2021

In this talk I will show how to construct a model structure on a locally presentable category with a suitable cylinder object such that the model structure behaves in a 'covariant' or 'contraviariant' way with respect to the cylinder. Examples of such model structures include the covariant and contravariant model structures on simplicial sets and the cocartesian and cartesian model structures on marked simplicial sets modelling presheaves with values in ∞-groupoids and ∞-categories respectively.

The model structures come with an abstract notion of cofinal functor which recovers the usual definition of cofinal functor for ∞-categories when applied to the covariant and contravariant model structures on simplicial sets. When applied yo presheaves valued in n-types, one obtains a version of Quillen’s Theorem A for n-categories.

Marcy Robertson: Expansions, completions and automorphisms of welded tangled foams

22nd April, 2021

Welded tangles are knotted surfaces in ℝ4. Bar-Natan and Dancso described a class of welded tangles which have 'foamed vertices' where one allows surfaces to merge and split. The resulting welded tangled foams carry an algebraic structure, similar to the planar algebras of Jones, called a circuit algebra. In joint work with Dancso and Halacheva we provide a one-to-one correspondence between circuit algebras and a form of rigid tensor category called 'wheeled props'. This is a higher-dimensional version of the well-known algebraic classification of planar algebras as certain pivotal categories.

This classification allows us to connect these 'welded tangled foams' to the Kashiwara-Vergne conjecture in Lie theory. In work in progress, we show that the group of homotopy automorphisms of the (rational completion of) the wheeled prop of welded foams is isomorphic to the group of symmetries KV, which acts on the solutions to the Kashiwara-Vergne conjecture. Moreover, we explain how this approach illuminates the close relationship between the group KV and the pro-unipotent Grothendieck–Teichmueller group.

Michael Ching: Tangent ∞-categories and Goodwillie calculus

8th April, 2021

In 1984 Rosický introduced tangent categories in order to capture axiomatically some properties of the tangent bundle functor on the category of smooth manifolds and smooth maps. Starting in 2014 Cockett and Cruttwell have developed this theory in more detail to emphasize connections with cartesian differential categories and other contexts arising from computer science and logic.

In this talk I will discuss joint work with Kristine Bauer and Matthew Burke which extends the notion of tangent category to ∞-categories. To make this generalization we use a characterization by Leung of tangent categories as modules over a symmetric monoidal category of Weil-algebras and algebra homomorphisms. Our main example of a tangent ∞-category is based on Lurie's model for the tangent bundle to an ∞-category itself. Thus we show that there is a tangent structure on the ∞-category of (differentiable) ∞-categories. This tangent structure encodes all the higher derivative information in Goodwillie’s calculus of functors, and sets the scene for further applications of ideas from differential geometry to higher category theory.

Evgeny Mukhin: Supersymmetric analogues of partitions and plane partitions

8th April, 2021

We will explain combinatorics of various partitions arising in the representation theory of quantum toroidal algebras associated to Lie superalgebra 𝔤𝔩(m|n). Apart from being interesting in its own right, this combinatorics is expected to be related to crystal bases, fixed points of the moduli spaces of BPS states, equivariant K-theory of moduli spaces of maps, and other things.

Jiří Adámek: C-Varieties of Ordered and Quantitative Algebras

1st April, 2021

Mardare, Panangaden and Plotkin introduced C-varieties of algbebras on metric spaces. These are categories of metric-enriched algebras specified by equations in a context. A context puts restrictions on the distances of variables one uses. We prove that C-varieties are precisely the monadic categories over Met for countably accessible enriched monads preserving epimorphisms.

We analogously introduce C-varieties of ordered algebras as categories specified by inequalities in a context. Which means that conditions on inequalities between variables are imposed. We prove that C-varieties precisely correspond to enriched finitary monads on Pos preserving epimorphisms.

Karol Szumilo: ∞-groupoids in lextensive categories

18th March, 2021

I will discuss a construction of a new model structure on simplicial objects in a countably lextensive category (i.e., a category with well-behaved finite limits and countable coproducts). This builds on previous work on a constructive model structure on simplicial sets, originally motivated by modelling Homotopy Type Theory, but now applicable in a much wider context.

Eric Faber: Simplicial Moore paths are polynomial

11th March, 2021

In this talk I will show that the simplicial Moore path functor, first defined by Van den Berg and Garner, is a polynomial functor. This result, which surprised us a bit at first, has helped a great deal in developing effective Kan fibrations for simplicial sets.

Paolo Perrone: Kan extensions are partial colimits

11th February, 2021

One way of interpreting a left Kan extension is as taking a kind of 'partial colimit', where one replaces parts of a diagram by their colimits. We make this intuition precise by means of the 'partial evaluations' sitting in the so-called bar construction of monads. The (pseudo)monads of interest for forming colimits are the monad of diagrams and the monad of small presheaves, both on the category CAT of locally small categories. We also define a morphism of monads between them, which we call 'image', and which takes the 'free colimit' of a diagram. This morphism allows us in particular to generalize the idea of 'cofinal functors', i.e. of functors which leave colimits invariant in an absolute way. This generalization includes the concept of absolute colimit as a special case. The main result of this work says that a pointwise left Kan extension of a diagram corresponds precisely to a partial evaluation of its colimit. This categorical result is analogous to what happens in the case of probability monads, where a conditional expectation of a random variable corresponds to a partial evaluation of its centre of mass.

Jiří Rosický: Metric monads

4th February, 2021

We develop universal algebra over an enriched category and relate it to finitary enriched monads. Using it, we deduce recent results about ordered universal algebra where inequations are used instead of equations. Then we apply it to metric universal algebra where quantitative equations are used instead of equations. This contributes to understanding of finitary monads on the category of metric spaces.