We study a one-dimensional transport equation with nonlocal velocity which was recently considered in the work of Crdoba, Crdoba and Fontelos [A. Crdoba, D. Crdoba, MA Fontelos, Formation of singularities for a transport equation with nonlocal velocity, Ann. of Math.(2) 162 (3)(2005) 13771389]. We show that in the subcritical and critical cases the problem is globally well-posed with arbitrary initial data in H max {3/2 , 0}. While in the supercritical case, the problem is locally well-posed with initial data in H 3/2 , and is globally well-posed under a smallness assumption. Some polynomial-in-time decay estimates are also discussed. These results improve some previous results in [A. Crdoba, D. Crdoba, MA Fontelos, Formation of singularities for a transport equation with nonlocal velocity, Ann. of Math.(2) 162 (3)(2005) 13771389].

We study two-dimensional conformal field theories in the semiclassical limit. In this limit, the four-point function is dominated by intermediate primaries of particular weights along with their descendants, and the crossing equations simplify drastically. For a four-point function receiving sufficiently small contributions from the light primaries, the structure constants involving heavy primaries follow a universal formula. Applying our results to the four-point function of the Z_2 twist field in the symmetric product orbifold, we produce the Hellerman bound and the logarithmically corrected Cardy formula that is valid for h ≥ c/12.

We study knots in 3d Chern-Simons theory with complex gauge group SL(N,C), in the context of its relation with 3d N=2 theory (the so-called 3d-3d correspondence). The defect has either co-dimension 2 or co-dimension 4 inside the 6d (2,0) theory, which is compactified on a 3-manifold M^. We identify such defects in various corners of the 3d-3d correspondence, namely in 3d SL(N,C) Chern-Simons theory, in 3d N=2 theory, in 5d N=2 super Yang-Mills theory, and in the M-theory holographic dual. We can make quantitative checks of the 3d-3d correspondence by computing partition functions at each of these theories. This Letter is a companion to a longer paper, which contains more details and more results.

For every smooth complex projective variety W of dimension d and nonnegative Kodaira dimension, we show the existence of a universal constant m depending only on d and two natural invariants of the very general fibres of an Iitaka fibration of W such that the pluricanonical system |mK_W| defines an Iitaka fibration. This is a consequence of a more general result on polarized adjoint divisors. In order to prove these results we develop a generalized theory of pairs, singularities, log canonical thresholds, adjunction, etc.

We study 2d and 3d gravity theories on spacetimes with causal (timelike or null) codimension one boundaries while allowing for variations in the position of the boundary. We construct the corresponding solution phase space and specify boundary degrees freedom by analysing boundary (surface) charges labelling them. We discuss Y and W freedoms and change of slicing in the solution space. For D dimensional case we find D + 1 surface charges, which are generic functions over the causal boundary. We show that there exist solution space slicings in which the charges are integrable. For the 3d case there exists an integrable slicing where charge algebra takes the form of Heisenberg ⊕ A3 where A3 is two copies of Virasoro at Brown-Henneaux central charge for AdS3 gravity and BMS3 for the 3d flat space gravity.