Fivebranes and 3-manifold homology

Abstract

Motivated by physical constructions of homological knot invariants, we study their analogs for closed 3-manifolds. We show that fivebrane compactifications provide a universal description of various old and new homological invariants of 3-manifolds. In terms of 3d/3d correspondence, such invariants are given by the Q-cohomology of the Hilbert space of partially topologically twisted 3d N=2 theory T[M_3] on a Riemann surface with defects. We demonstrate this by concrete and explicit calculations in the case of monopole/Heegaard Floer homology and a 3-manifold analog of Khovanov-Rozansky link homology. The latter gives a categorification of Chern-Simons partition function. Some of the new key elements include the explicit form of the S-transform and a novel connection between categorification and a previously mysterious role of Eichler integrals in Chern-Simons theory.