A generalization of Witten's conjecture for the Pixton class and the noncommutative KdV hierarchy

Abstract

In this paper, we formulate and present ample evidence towards the conjecture that the partition function (i.e. the exponential of the generating series of intersection numbers with monomials in psi classes) of the Pixton class on the moduli space of stable curves is the topological tau function of the noncommutative KdV hierarchy, which we introduced in a previous work. The specialization of this conjecture to the top degree part of Pixton's class states that the partition function of the double ramification cycle is the tau function of the dispersionless limit of this hierarchy. In fact, we prove that this conjecture follows from the Double Ramification/Dubrovin--Zhang equivalence conjecture. We also provide several independent computational checks in support of it.