Triply mixed coverings of arbitrary base curves: quasimodularity, quantum curves and a mysterious topological recursion

Abstract

Simple Hurwitz numbers are classical invariants in enumerative geometry counting branched morphisms between Riemann surfaces with fixed ramification data. In recent years, several modifications of this notion for genus $0$ base curves have appeared in the literature. Among them are so-called monotone Hurwitz numbers, which are related to the Harish–Chandra–Itzykson–Zuber integral in random matrix theory and strictly monotone Hurwitz numbers which enumerate certain Grothendieck dessins d’enfants. We generalise the notion of Hurwitz numbers to interpolations between simple, monotone and strictly monotone Hurwitz numbers for arbitrary genera and any number of arbitrary but fixed ramification profiles. This yields generalisations of several results known for Hurwitz numbers. When the target surface is of genus one, we show that the generating series of these interpolated Hurwitz numbers are quasimodular forms. In the case that all ramification is simple, we refine this result by writing this series as a sum of quasimodular forms corresponding to tropical covers weighted by Gromov–Witten invariants. Moreover, we derive a quantum curve for monotone and Grothendieck dessins d’enfants Hurwitz numbers for arbitrary genera and one arbitrary but fixed ramification profile. Thus, we obtain spectral curves via the semi-classical limit as input data for the Chekhov–Eynard–Orantin (CEO) topological recursion. Astonishingly, we find that the CEO topological recursion for the genus 1 spectral curve of the strictly monotone Hurwitz numbers computes the monotone Hurwitz numbers in genus 0. Thus, we give a new proof that monotone Hurwitz numbers satisfy CEO topological recursion. This points to an unknown relation between those enumerative invariants. Finally, specializing to target surface $P^1$, we find recursions for monotone and Grothendieck dessins d’enfants double Hurwitz numbers, which enables the computation of the respective Hurwitz numbers for any genera with one arbitrary but fixed ramification profile.