Wilson surfaces and higher dimensional knot invariants (Q2577435)

Wilson loops play an important role in the quantization of gauge theories and for constructing invariants of framed knots. In this higher-dimensional generalization, the authors study Wilson surfaces for the non-Abelian BF theory using the Batalin-Vilkovisky (BV) formalism. For such topological theories, the expectation value of the Wilson surfaces yields invariants for codimension two embeddings, i.e. higher-dimensional knots. In an perturbative expansion up to order three, they recover the self-linking number and the Bott invariant, whereas a new term turns out to be an invariant for long 2-knots, i.e. those with fixed linear behavior at infinity. Reviewer's remarks: The relation between knots and perturbation theory in QFT is exposed in the book of \textit{D. Kreimer} [Knots and Feynman diagrams. Cambridge Lecture Notes in Physics. 13. (Cambridge): Cambridge University Press (2000; Zbl 0964.81052)]; a third-order link invariant has been deduced from expectation values of Wilson loops in Chern-Simons theory by \textit{A.~C.~Hirshfeld, U.~Sassenberg} and \textit{T.~Klöker} [J.\ Knot Theory Ramifications 6, 243--280 (1997; Zbl 0881.57010)], whereas an application of knotted 2-spheres in general relativity has been proposed by \textit{E. W. Mielke} [Gen. Relativ Gravitation 8, 175--196 (1977; Zbl 0416.57001), reprinted in ``Knots and Applications'', L. H. Kauffman, ed., World Scientific, Singapore, 478 p. (1995; Zbl 0383.00015)].