Quanta Magazine

Three Decades Later, Mystery Numbers Explained

Zeta values seem to connect distant geometric worlds. In a new proof, mathematicians finally
explain why.

By Kevin Hartnett

Olena Shmahalo/Quanta Magazine

Almost thirty years ago, a group of physicists noticed some of the most important numbers in
mathematics appearing where they didn’t seem to belong. A new proof finally explains why they’re
there.

The work, which is still unpublished, is by four leading mathematicians in the field of mirror
symmetry. It explains why the so-called zeta values — numbers that have preoccupied
mathematicians since the mid-18th century — are implicated in the numerical mystery at the heart
of one of the most active fields in contemporary mathematics.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/three-decades-later-mystery-numbers-explained-20180503/ May 3, 2018

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“Our work gives some kind of geometric explanation for the origin of these strange numbers,” said
Nick Sheridan, a research fellow at the University of Cambridge and co-author of the work.

The zeta values are numbers generated by taking an infinite sum. For example, zeta of 2 is equal to
1 + 1/22 + 1/32 + 1/42 + … , while zeta of 3 is equal to 1 + 1/23 + 1/33 + 1/43 + …. The zeta values
appear in many areas of mathematics, including, most famously, the Riemann hypothesis, which
relates to the distribution of prime numbers.

[abstractions]

As I explained in my recent feature story on the state of mirror symmetry, “Mathematicians Explore
Mirror Link Between Two Geometric Worlds,” the field was discovered by accident. In the early
1990s, physicists were trying to figure out the details of string theory. They wanted to explain the
physical world as a product of tiny, vibrating strings woven through an additional six dimensions of
space. They tried to understand what the geometry of those six dimensions might be. The first option
came from the mathematical field of algebraic geometry; a second one came from the mathematical
field of symplectic geometry. To the trained mathematical eye, the two could hardly have seemed
more different.

And yet, the physicists noticed some strange similarities between them. In particular, when they
performed a calculation on one space, they generated numbers that matched the numbers they
generated when they performed a very different type of calculation on the other side. “Two things
that looked, in principle, unrelated, magically were equal,” said Denis Auroux, a mathematician at
the University of California, Berkeley.

Mathematicians and physicists began excavating the mirror relationship. They soon built
increasingly abstracted mathematical entities atop the foundations of the underlying symplectic and
complex geometric spaces. You can think of these more abstract mathematical entities as houses
whose architecture reflects the foundations they’ve been built on.

In the setting of mirror symmetry, points on the house whose coordinate values previously were
integers become points whose coordinate values are now multiples of different zeta values. The
process effectively rotates the space. “It’s been rotated, and the amount it’s been rotated by maybe
will involve some of these zeta values,” said Sheridan.

Mathematicians have noticed the presence of zeta values almost since the beginning of the study of
mirror symmetry. “The arithmetic is fascinating and has been explored in a lot of examples, but it’s
missing a conceptual explanation. We’ve been trying to get more of a conceptual explanation,” said
Sheel Ganatra, a mathematician at the University of Southern California and co-author of the new
work along with Sheridan, Mohammed Abouzaid of Columbia University and Hiroshi Iritani of Kyoto
University. This new work explains why the zeta values are there.

The explanation has to do with intrinsic geometric features of the two sides of mirror symmetry. A
foundational question in mirror symmetry, called the SYZ conjecture, says it should be possible to
take one mirror space, break it down into pieces, manipulate those pieces, and then use them to
construct the second mirror space. It’s as though you had a big shape made of Legos, took it apart,
and used the pieces to build something new.

When you break down the first space into Lego-like pieces, most of the pieces will be the same, but
there will also be some special blocks — the odd green or yellow piece in a sea of reds and blues.

In their new work, the mathematicians prove that each kind of special piece is associated to a zeta

https://www.quantamagazine.org/three-decades-later-mystery-numbers-explained-20180503/ May 3, 2018

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value. Maybe the green blocks are associated to zeta of 2, and therefore if you have five greens
when you take apart your first mirror space, the structure atop your rebuilt mirror space will have
its coordinates offset by a factor of five times zeta of 2.

In this new work, the four mathematicians use techniques from a field called tropical geometry.
Using those techniques, they prove that these “special pieces” explain why numbers on opposite
sides of the mirror differ by exactly a factor of zeta values. So far, their proof holds for many cases of
mirror symmetry. The authors are waiting until they’ve been able to prove even more cases before
they make the proof public.

The work is also emblematic of an overall trend in mirror symmetry. The field began in revelation
and is advancing rapidly toward understanding. Instead of simply cataloging mysterious phenomena
— these sets of numbers match! — mathematicians are beginning to really explain why mirror
phenomena occur at all.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/three-decades-later-mystery-numbers-explained-20180503/ May 3, 2018