Bordism and Resolution of Singularities in Gromov-Witten Theory

Explore a 55-minute lecture from Stanford University's Mohammed Abouzaid examining the complex relationship between bordism theory and singularity resolution in symplectic topology. Delve into the geometric foundations of Gromov-Witten theory, focusing on moduli spaces of (pseudo)-holomorphic curves and their target symplectic manifolds. Learn how these spaces transcend traditional manifold and orbifold classifications due to symmetry considerations, leading to their characterization as derived orbifolds. Discover collaborative research with Shaoyun Bai that combines resolution of singularities algorithms for complex algebraic varieties with Fukaya and Ono's normally complex perturbations to analyze the connection between unitary bordism and stably complex derived orbifold bordism groups.