The derivative of global surface-holonomy for a non-abelian gerbe

Abstract: Starting with a non-abelian gerbe represented by a non-abelian differential cocycle, with values in a given crossed-module, this paper explicitly calculates a formula for the derivative of the associated surface holonomy of squares mapped into the base manifold; with spheres later considered as a special case. While the definitions in this paper used for gerbes, their connections, and the induced holonomy will initially be simplicial, translations into a cubical setting will be provided to aide in explicit coordinate-based calculations. While there are many previously published results on the properties of these non-abelian gerbes, including some calculations of the derivative over a single open set, this paper endeavors to take these local calculations and glue them together across multiple open sets in order to obtain a single expression for the change in surface holonomy with respect to a one-parameter family of squares.