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Creators/Authors contains: "Geer, Nathan"

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  1. We develop representation theoretic techniques to construct three dimensional non-semisimple topological quantum field theories which model homologically truncated topological B-twists of abelian Gaiotto--Witten theory with linear matter. Our constructions are based on relative modular structures on the category of weight modules over an unrolled quantization of a Lie superalgebra. The Lie superalgebra, originally defined by Gaiotto and Witten, is associated to a complex symplectic representation of a metric abelian Lie algebra. The physical theories we model admit alternative realizations as Chern--Simons-Rozansky--Witten theories and supergroup Chern--Simons theories and include as particular examples global forms of gl(1,1)-Chern--Simons theory and toral Chern--Simons theory. Fundamental to our approach is the systematic incorporation of non-genuine line operators which source flat connections for the topological flavour symmetry of the theory. 
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    Free, publicly-accessible full text available January 11, 2026
  2. We introduce an unrolled quantization U_q^E(gl(1,1)) of the complex Lie superalgebra gl(1,1) and use its categories of weight modules to construct and study new three dimensional non-semisimple topological quantum field theories. These theories are defined on categories of cobordisms which are decorated by ribbon graphs and cohomology classes and take values in categories of graded super vector spaces. Computations in these theories are enabled by a detailed study of the representation theory of U_q^E(gl(1,1)). We argue that by restricting to subcategories of integral weight modules we obtain topological quantum field theories which are mathematical models of Chern--Simons theories with gauge supergroups psl(1,1,) and U(1,1) coupled to background flat \mathbb{C}^{\times}-connections, as studied in the physics literature by Rozansky--Saleur and Mikhaylov. In particular, we match Verlinde formulae and mapping class group actions on state spaces of non-generic tori with results in the physics literature. We also obtain explicit descriptions of state spaces of generic surfaces, including their graded dimensions, which go beyond results in the physics literature. 
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    Free, publicly-accessible full text available November 26, 2025
  3. For [Formula: see text] a commutative group, we give a purely Hopf [Formula: see text]-coalgebra construction of [Formula: see text]-colored [Formula: see text]-manifolds invariants using the notion of modified integral. 
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  4. In [M. De Renzi, A. Gainutdinov, N. Geer, B. Patureau-Mirand and I. Runkel, 3-dimensional TQFTs from non-semisimple modular categories, preprint (2019), arXiv:1912.02063[math.GT]], we constructed 3-dimensional topological quantum field theories (TQFTs) using not necessarily semisimple modular categories. Here, we study projective representations of mapping class groups of surfaces defined by these TQFTs, and we express the action of a set of generators through the algebraic data of the underlying modular category [Formula: see text]. This allows us to prove that the projective representations induced from the non-semisimple TQFTs of the above reference are equivalent to those obtained by Lyubashenko via generators and relations in [V. Lyubashenko, Invariants of 3-manifolds and projective representations of mapping class groups via quantum groups at roots of unity, Comm. Math. Phys. 172(3) (1995) 467–516, arXiv:hep-th/9405167]. Finally, we show that, when [Formula: see text] is the category of finite-dimensional representations of the small quantum group of [Formula: see text], the action of all Dehn twists for surfaces without marked points has infinite order. 
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  5. Abstract We develop the categorical context for defining Hermitian non‐semisimple topological quantum field theories (TQFTs). We prove that relative Hermitian modular categories give rise to modified Hermitian Witten–Reshetikhin–Turaev TQFTs and provide numerous examples of these structures coming from the representation theory of quantum groups and quantum superalgebras. The Hermitian theory developed here for the modified Turaev–Viro TQFT is applied to define new pseudo‐Hermitian topological phases that can be considered as non‐semisimple analogs of Levin–Wen models. 
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