Configuration spaces, props and wheel-free deformation quantization

The main theme of this thesis is higher algebraic structures that come from operads and props. The first chapter is an introduction to the mathematical framework needed for the content of this thesis. The chapter does not contain any new results. The second chapter is concerned with the construction of a configuration space model for a particular 2-colored differential graded operad encoding the structure of two A ∞ algebras with two A ∞ morphisms and a homotopy between the morphisms. The cohomology of this operad is shown to be the well-known 2-colored operad encoding the structure of two associative algebras and of an associative algebra morphism between them. The third chapter is concerned with deformation quantization of (potentially) infinite dimensional (quasi-)Poisson manifolds. Our proof employs a variation on the transcendental methods pioneered by M. Kontsevich for the finite dimensional case. The first proof of the infinite dimensional case is due to B. Shoikhet. A key feature of the first proof is the construction of a universal L ∞ structure on formal polyvector fields. Our contribution is a simplification of B. Shoikhet proof by considering a more natural configuration space and a simpler choice of propagator . The result is also put into a natural context of the dg Lie algebras coming from graph complexes; the L ∞ structure is proved to come from a Maurer-Cartan element in the oriented graph complex . The fourth chapter also deals with deformation quantization of (quasi-)Poisson structures in the infinite dimensional setting. Unlike the previous chapter, the methods used here are purely algebraic. Our main theorem is the possibility to deformation quantize quasi-Poisson structures by only using perturbative methods; in contrast to the transcendental methods employed in the previous chapter. We give two proofs of the theorem via the theory of dg operads, dg properads and dg props. We show that there is a dg prop morphism from a prop governing star-products to a dg prop(erad) governing (quasi-)Poisson structures. This morphism gives a theorem about the existence of a deformation quantization of (quasi-)Poisson structure. The proof proceeds by giving an explicit deformation quantization of s uper-involutive Lie bialgebras and then lifting that to the dg properad governing quasi-Poisson structures. The prop governing star-products was first considered by S.A. Merkulov, but the properad governing quasi-Poisson structures is a new construc