Vertex operator algebras and conformal blocks

Abstract

Conformal blocks are central objects in the study of 2d conformal field theory and vertex operator algebras (VOAs). Indeed, many important problems in VOAs are related to conformal blocks, including modular invariance of VOA characters (the earliest such type of problem is the famous monstrous moonshine conjecture), the construction of tensor categories for VOA representations, the study of the relationship between VOAs and low dimensional topology, and so on. I will give a brief review of the development of VOA conformal block theory and some recent progress.

Speaker

归斌，2018年毕业于美国范德堡大学并获得博士学位。2018-2021年在美国罗格斯大学从事博士后研究工作。2021年至今任清华大学丘成桐数学科学中心助理教授。主要研究领域为二维共形场论的数学理论，包括顶点算子代数，共形网（更一般地，代数量子场论，主要运用Von Neumann代数和子因子的方法），张量范畴。