Euler characteristics of Hilbert schemes of points on surfaces with simple singularities

Abstract: This is an announcement of conjectures and results concerning the generating series of Euler characteristics of Hilbert schemes of points on surfaces with simple (Kleinian) singularities. For a quotient surface C^2/G with G a finite subgroup of SL(2, C), we conjecture a formula for this generating series in terms of Lie-theoretic data, which is compatible with existing results for type A singularities. We announce a proof of our conjecture for singularities of type D. The generating series in our conjecture can be seen as a specialized character of the basic representation of the corresponding (extended) affine Lie algebra; we discuss possible representation-theoretic consequences of this fact. Our results, respectively conjectures, imply the modularity of the generating function for surfaces with type A and type D, respectively arbitrary, simple singularities, confirming predictions of S-duality.