AbstractRickard complexes in the context of categorified quantum groups can be used to construct braid group actions. We define and study certain natural deformations of these complexes which we call curved Rickard complexes. One application is to obtain deformations of link homologies which generalize those of Batson–Seed [3] [J. Batson and C. Seed, A link-splitting spectral sequence in Khovanov homology,
Duke Math. J. 164 2015, 5, 801–841] and Gorsky–Hogancamp [E. Gorsky and M. Hogancamp, Hilbert schemes and y-ification of Khovanov–Rozansky homology,
preprint 2017] to arbitrary representations/partitions. Another is to relate the deformed homology defined algebro-geometrically in [S. Cautis and J. Kamnitzer,
Knot homology via derived categories of coherent sheaves IV, colored links,
Quantum Topol. 8 2017, 2, 381–411] to categorified quantum groups (this was the original motivation for this paper).
Fixing the functoriality of Khovanov homology: a simple approach