Yang-Mills-Higgs Equations on Spherical Orbifolds

Abstract: In this paper we study (static) solutions of the rank 2 Yang-Mills-Higgs equations on the Riemann sphere, with concical singularities, that bifurcate from constant curvature connections. We focus attention on the case where there are exactly four such singularities. This study brings together ideas from the gauge theory of constant curvature connections on vector bundles over singular Riemann surfaces with the Riemann-Hilbert analysis of classical Fuchsian ODEs.