Asymptotics of some quantum invariants of the Whitehead chains

Abstract

In this paper, we study the asymptotics of the colored Jones polynomials of the Whitehead chains with one belt colored by $M_1$ and all the clasps colored by $M_2$ evaluated at the $(N+1/2)$-th root of unity $t=e^{\frac{2\pi i}{N+1/2}}$, where $M_1$ and $M_2$ are sequences of integers in $N$. By considering the limiting ratios, $s_1$ and $s_2$, of $M_1$ and $M_2$ to $(N+1/2)$, we show that the exponential growth rate of the invariants coincides with the hyperbolic volume of the link complement equipped with certain (possibly incomplete) hyperbolic structure parametrized by $s_1$ and $s_2$. In the proof we figure out the correspondence between the critical point equations of the potential functions and the hyperbolic gluing equations of certain triangulations of the link complements. Furthermore, we discover a connection between the potential function, the theory of angle structures and the covolume function. As a corollary, we prove the volume conjecture for the Turaev-Viro invariants for all Whitehead chains complements.