We study BPS spectra of D-branes on local Calabi-Yau threefolds O(−p)⊕O(p−2)→P^1 with p=0,1, corresponding to C^3/Z_2 and the resolved conifold. Nonabelianization for exponential networks is applied to compute directly unframed BPS indices counting states with D2 and D0 brane charges. Known results on these BPS spectra are correctly reproduced by computing new types of BPS invariants of 3d-5d BPS states, encoded by nonabelianization, through their wall-crossing. We also develop the notion of exponential BPS graphs for the simplest toric examples, and show that they encode both the quiver and the potential associated to the Calabi-Yau via geometric engineering.

We re-examine the constraints imposed by causality and unitarity on the low-energy effective field theory expansion of four-particle scattering amplitudes, exposing a hidden “totally positive” structure strikingly similar to the positive geometries associated with grassmannians and amplituhedra. This forces the infinite tower of higher-dimension operators to lie inside a new geometry we call the “EFT-hedron”. We initiate a systematic investigation of the boundary structure of the EFT-hedron, giving infinitely many linear and non-linear inequalities that must be satisfied by the EFT expansion in any theory. We illustrate the EFT-hedron geometry and constraints in a wide variety of examples, including new consistency conditions on the scattering amplitudes of photons and gravitons in the real world.

We introduce a quantum trace map for an ideally triangulated hyperbolic knot complement S^3∖K. The map assigns a quantum operator to each element of Kauffmann Skein module of the 3-manifold. The quantum operator lives in a module generated by products of quantized edge parameters of the ideal triangulation modulo some equivalence relations determined by gluing equations. Combining the quantum map with a state-integral model of SL(2,C) Chern-Simons theory, one can define perturbative invariants of knot K in the knot complement whose leading part is determined by its complex hyperbolic length. We then conjecture that the perturbative invariants determine an asymptotic expansion of the Jones polynomial for a link composed of K and K. We propose the explicit quantum trace map for figure-eight knot complement and confirm the length conjecture up to the second order in the asymptotic expansion both numerically and analytically.

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We demonstrate that a supersymmetric and parity violating version of Vasiliev's higher spin gauge theory in AdS4 admits boundary conditions that preserve $\mathcal{N}=0,1,2,3,4$ or 6 supersymmetries. In particular, we argue that the Vasiliev theory with U(M) Chan–Paton and $\mathcal{N}=6$ boundary condition is holographically dual to the 2+1 dimensional U(N)_k × U(M)_{−k} ABJ theory in the limit of large N, k and finite M. In this system all bulk higher spin fields transform in the adjoint of the U(M) gauge group, whose bulk t'Hooft coupling is M/N. Analysis of boundary conditions in Vasiliev theory allows us to determine exact relations between the parity breaking phase of Vasiliev theory and the coefficients of two and three point functions in Chern–Simons vector models at large N. Our picture suggests that the supersymmetric Vasiliev theory can be obtained as a limit of type IIA string theory in AdS_4\times \mathbb {CP}^3, and that the non-Abelian Vasiliev theory at strong bulk 't Hooft coupling smoothly turn into a string field theory. The fundamental string is a singlet bound state of Vasiliev's higher spin particles held together by U(M) gauge interactions. This is illustrated by the thermal partition function of free ABJ theory on a two sphere at large M and N even in the analytically tractable free limit. In this system the traces or strings of the low temperature phase break up into their Vasiliev particulate constituents at a U(M) deconfinement phase transition of order unity. At a higher temperature of order $T=\sqrt{\frac{N}{M}}$ Vasiliev's higher spin fields themselves break up into more elementary constituents at a U(N) deconfinement temperature, in a process described in the bulk as black hole nucleation. This article is part of a special issue of Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical devoted to 'Higher spin theories and holography'.