Math Graduate Student Seminar

Given a monoidal category we can represent morphisms in the category using beads on strings and further structure on the monoidal category (e.g. braided, rigid, ribbon, ...) can be encoded as geometrical properties on these strings. Given a ribbon monoidal category its string diagrams naturally give rise to a family link invariants indexed by objects in the category. I will give a construction of the Temperley-Lieb category whose string diagram calculus produces the Jones Polynomial.