Generalized Kloosterman Sums from M2-branes

Abstract

Kloosterman sums play a special role in analytic number theory, for expressing the integer Fourier coefficients of modular forms as an infinite sum of Bessel functions, also known as Rademacher formula. The generalization to vector-valued modular forms is known as generalized Kloosterman sums. In the paper arxiv:1404.0033, a remarkable connection between these arithmetic sums and quantum black hole entropy was found. Nevertheless, the computation was particular for one-eighth BPS black holes in $\mathcal{N}=8$ string theory, which have a simple counting formula. Here, we review this construction and extend it to the case of one-quarter BPS black holes in $\mathcal{N}=4$ string theory, which are counted by (mock) Jacobi forms of arbitrary index. The main result is an holographic derivation of the Kloosterman sums which includes the intricate sum over phases and depends exactly on the spectral flow sectors and the spectrum of polar states. On the microscopic side we derive an analytic formula for the Kloosterman sums valid for any index, whereas from the macroscopic side we reproduce the same formula from the M-theory path integral on $\mathbb{Z}_c$ orbifolds of $AdS_2\times S^1$. A key aspect of the derivation is the identification of the spectral flow sectors with the contribution of M2 branes wrapping cycles on the compactification manifold. After a careful treatment of the measure, the sum over orbifolds results in the sum over Bessels, in perfect agreement with the Rademacher expansion at any order in perturbation theory.