Tropical resolutions of configuration hypersurfaces

Abstract

Configuration polynomials generalize the Kirchhoff polynomial of a graph, as well as the Symanzik polynomials that appear in the denominators of Feynman integrands. The configuration hypersurfaces cut out by such polynomials are typically highly singular, which poses a challenge for the evaluation of Feynman integrals even in simplified settings. In this paper, we provide a two-step recipe for a resolution of singularities of any irreducible configuration hypersurface. We first consider the normalization of the Nash blow-up, which we identify with an incidence variety introduced by Bloch. This variety is typically still not smooth, but it is the closure of a smooth subvariety of a torus. The latter then a smooth, tropical compactification, using work of Tevelev. We construct explicitly such a compactification and a morphism to the normalized Nash blow-up for every configuration, described in terms of bipermutohedral matroid combinatorics introduced by Ardila, Denham and Huh. Along the way, we find that the normalized Nash blow-up of the configuration hypersurface has strongly $F$-regular singularities in positive characteristic. We deduce this by certifying $F$-rationality of its biprojective cone, and infer from it that the normalized Nash blow-up has rational singularities over the complex numbers.