Black Holes, Instanton Counting on Toric Singularities and q-Deformed Two-Dimensional Yang-Mills Theory

TL;DR

This paper explores the connection between instanton counting in N=4 Yang-Mills theory on toric orbifolds and q-deformed Yang-Mills theory, providing insights into black hole microstate counting via two-dimensional gauge theories.

Contribution

It establishes a detailed relationship between instanton counting, q-deformed Yang-Mills, and Chern-Simons theory on Lens spaces, clarifying their roles in black hole microstate enumeration.

Findings

Instanton contributions are explicitly linked to D-brane bound state counting.

The correct instanton counting requires treating Chern-Simons terms as boundary conditions.

The study extends to instantons on higher genus Riemann surfaces.

Abstract

We study the relationship between instanton counting in N=4 Yang-Mills theory on a generic four-dimensional toric orbifold and the semi-classical expansion of q-deformed Yang-Mills theory on the blowups of the minimal resolution of the orbifold singularity, with an eye to clarifying the recent proposal of using two-dimensional gauge theories to count microstates of black holes in four dimensions. We describe explicitly the instanton contributions to the counting of D-brane bound states which are captured by the two-dimensional gauge theory. We derive an intimate relationship between the two-dimensional Yang-Mills theory and Chern-Simons theory on generic Lens spaces, and use it to show that the correct instanton counting is only reproduced when the Chern-Simons contributions are treated as non-dynamical boundary conditions in the D4-brane gauge theory. We also use this correspondence to discuss the counting of instantons on higher genus ruled Riemann surfaces.