Novikov-Veselov symmetries of the two-dimensional \(O(N)\) sigma model (Q2073673)

This paper is a contribution to the special issue on mathematics of integrable systems: classical and quantum in honor of Leon Takhtajan. It is a continuation of [the authors, ``Towards Lefschetz thimbles in sigma models. I'', J. Exp. Theor. Phys. 132, 734--751 (2021; \url{doi:10.1134/S1063776121040129})], where the most important case is the complexified twisted one. In particular, it motivates the Fermi-curve approach the authors also employ presently. Nevertheless, in this paper, mostly, they study the real untwisted case. The aim is to show that Novikov-Veselov hierarchy provides a complete family of commuting symmetries of two-dimensional \(O(N)\) sigma model. In the first part of the paper the authors use these symmetries to prove that the Fermi spectral curve for the double-periodic sigma model is algebraic. Thus, their previous construction of the complexified harmonic maps in the case of irreducible Fermi curves is complete. In the second part of the paper they generalize their construction to the case of reducible Fermi curves and show that it gives the conformal harmonic maps to even-dimensional spheres. Remarkably, the solutions are parameterized by spectral curves of turning points of the elliptic Calogero-Moser system. This paper is organized as follows: Section 1 is an introduction to the subject and statement of the results. Section 2 deals with Novikov-Veselov hierarchy. Section 3 is devoted to the Novikov-Veselov flows as symmetries of \(O(N)\) model. The goal here is to show that the Novikov-Veselov hierarchy defines a set of commuting symmetries of the \(O(N)\) sigma model. Section 4 deals with \(O(N)\) sigma model on a two-torus. In Section 5 the authors extend their construction to the case of reducible Fermi curves. It gives branched conformal maps of two-torus to the real even dimensional spheres \(S^{2n}\), i.e., the periodic solutions of the two-dimensional \(O(2n+1)\) sigma model. It turns out that for the reducible Fermi curve the periodicity constraints admit an explicit solution: the irreducible components are the spectral curves of the elliptic Calogero-Moser system corresponding to its turning points.