Quantum cohomology from mixed Higgs-Coulomb phases

Abstract

Abstract We generalize Coulomb-branch-based gauged linear sigma model (GLSM)–computations of quantum cohomology rings of Fano spaces. Typically such computations have focused on GLSMs without superpotential, for which the low energy limit of the GLSM is a pure Coulomb branch, and quantum cohomology is determined by the critical locus of a twisted one-loop effective superpotential. We extend these results to cases for which the low energy limit of the GLSM includes both Coulomb and Higgs branches, where the latter is a Landau-Ginzburg orbifold. We describe the state spaces and products of corresponding operators in detail, comparing a geometric phase description, where the operator product ring is quantum cohomology, to the description in terms of Coulomb and Higgs branch states. As a concrete test of our methods, we compare to existing mathematics results for quantum cohomology rings of hypersurfaces in projective spaces.

Keywords

• Conformal Field Models in String Theory
• Differential and Algebraic Geometry
• Topological Field Theories
• Topological Strings