Abstract State Machines 1988-1998: Commented ASM Bibliography

An annotated bibliography of papers which deal with or use Abstract State Machines (ASMs), as of January 1998.Comment: Also maintained as a BibTeX file at http://www.eecs.umich.edu/gasm

Topological Invariants For Lens Spaces And Exceptional Quantum Groups

The Reshetikhin - Turaev invariants arising from the quantum groups associated with the exceptional Lie algebras $G_2$, $F_4$ and $E_8$ at odd roots of unity are constructed and explicitly computed for all the lens spaces.Comment: LaTeX 10 page

The N=1 triplet vertex operator superalgebras

We introduce a new family of C_2-cofinite N=1 vertex operator superalgebras SW(m), $m \geq 1$, which are natural super analogs of the triplet vertex algebra family W(p), $p \geq 2$, important in logarithmic conformal field theory. We classify irreducible SW(m)-modules and discuss logarithmic modules. We also compute bosonic and fermionic formulas of irreducible SW(m) characters. Finally, we contemplate possible connections between the category of SW(m)-modules and the category of modules for the quantum group U^{small}_q(sl_2), q=e^{\frac{2 \pi i}{2m+1}}, by focusing primarily on properties of characters and the Zhu's algebra A(SW(m)). This paper is a continuation of arXiv:0707.1857.Comment: 53 pages; v2: references added; v3: a few changes; v4: final version, to appear in CM

Perturbative sigma models, elliptic cohomology and the Witten genus

We provide a differential cocycle model for elliptic cohomology with complex coefficients and use analytic methods to construct a cocycle representative for the Witten class in this language. Our motivation stems from the conjectural connection between 2-dimensional field theories and elliptic cohomology originally due to G. Segal and E. Witten. The specifics of our constructions are informed by the work of S. Stolz and P. Teichner on super Euclidean field theories and K. Costello's construction of the Witten genus using perturbative quantization. As a warm-up, we prove analogous results for supersymmetric quantum mechanics and K-theory with complex coefficients.Comment: Changes made from referees suggestions: statements of main theorems were sharpened, physical motivations were separated from the main mathematical discussion, and the relation to Witten's original construction was clarifie

Commutative 2-cocycles on Lie algebras

On Lie algebras, we study commutative 2-cocycles, i.e., symmetric bilinear forms satisfying the usual cocycle equation. We note their relationship with antiderivations and compute them for some classes of Lie algebras, including finite-dimensional semisimple, current and Kac-Moody algebras.Comment: v7: minor changes; added ancillary file with GAP cod