Algebraic structures on modules of diagrams (Q531337)

A Jacobi Diagram is a combinatorial object, which gives rise to a finite-type (Vassiliev) invariant when combined with an algebraic object called a weight system. Jacobi diagrams can be assembled into a graded Hopf algebra \(\mathcal{A}\) over \(\mathbb{Q}\). The only known systematic way to construct weight systems starts from a semisimple Lie (super)algebra equipped with a nonsingular invariant bilinear form and a finite-dimensional representation. In the early days of quantum topology, one of its central widely-believed conjectures was that every weight system arises from such a construction. This paper is an updated and expanded version of the author's 1995 preprint where he constructed a counterexample to the above conjecture. More precisely, Vogel constructed a nontrivial primitive element in \(\mathcal{A}\) killed by all semisimple Lie (super)algebras equipped with a nonsingular invariant bilinear form and a finite-dimensional representation. This counterexample stands as one of quantum topology's central negative results. It shows that there might be strictly more to quantum topology than souped-up Lie theory, although at the time of this review, 16 years after Vogel's preprint, we still don't know a single such result. A lot of smart people have thought hard about combinatorics of Jacobi diagrams, but results have been sparse. Vogel's counterexample is a rare deep result about combinatorics in \(\mathcal{A}\), and therefore his methods surely deserve serious further investigation. Vogel first defines a graded algebra \(\Lambda\) which acts on certain natural modules in \(\mathcal{A}\) via local substitutions reminiscent of the delta-wye transform in electrical network theory. The precise description of \(\Lambda\) is an important open problem. He then lists eight Lie superalgebras such that, if a Jacobi diagram is killed by each element of this list, it is killed by any semisimple Lie superalgebra weight system. The most interesting of these is a certain Lie superalgebra \(D(2,1,\alpha)\). He then constructs a non-trivial element of \(\mathcal{A}\) which no Lie superalgebra detects by utilizing the action of \(\Lambda\) on the `tetrahedron' Jacobi diagram. In the reviewer's opinion, anyone studying the combinatorics of Jacobi diagrams should carefully read this paper.