The action of origin-preserving diffeomorphisms on a space of jets of symmetric connections is considered. Dimensions of moduli spaces of generic connections are calculated. Poincaré series of the geometric structure of symmetric connection is constructed, and shown to be a rational function.
We consider local invariants of general connections (with torsion). The group of origin-preserving diffeomorphisms acts on a space of jets of general connections. Dimensions of moduli spaces of generic connections are calculated. Poincaré series of the geometric structure of connection is constructed, and shown to be a rational function, confirming the finiteness assertion of Tresse.
The moduli space of jets of certain G-structures (basically those which admit a canonical linear connection) is shown to be isomorphic to the quotient of a natural G-module by G.
We describe the ringed-space structure of moduli spaces of jets of linear connections (at a point) as orbit spaces of certain linear representations of the general linear group. Then, we use this fact to prove that the only (scalar) differential invariants associated to linear connections are constant functions, as well as to recover various expressions appearing in the literature regarding the Poincaré series of these moduli spaces.
We introduce a symplectic structure on the space of connections in a G-principal bundle over a four-manifold and the Hamiltonian action on it of the group of gauge transformations which are trivial on the boundary. The symplectic reduction becomes the moduli space of flat connections over the manifold. On the moduli space of flat connections we shall construct a hermitian line bundle with connection whose curvature is given by the symplectic form. This is the Chern-Simons prequantum line bundle. The group of gauge transformations on the boundary of the base manifold acts on the moduli space of…
We examine the moduli spaces of Type~A connections on oriented and unoriented surfaces both with and without torsion in relation to the signature of the associated symmetric Ricci tensor. If the signature of the symmetric Ricci tensor is (1,1) or (0,2), the moduli spaces are smooth. If the signature is (2,0), there is an orbifold singularity.
In this paper, we explain how generalized dynamical r-matrices can be obtained by (quasi-)Poisson reduction. New examples of Poisson structures and Poisson groupoid actions naturally appear in this setting. As an application, we use a generalized dynamical r-matrix induced by the gauge fixing procedure to give a new finite dimensional description of the Atiyah-Bott symplectic structure on the moduli space of flat connections on a surface.
Let $π\colon P\to M$ be a principal bundle and $p$ an invariant polynomial of degree r on the Lie algebra of the structure group. The theory of Chern-Simons differential characters is exploited to define an homology map $χ^{k} : H_{2r-k-1}(M)\times H_{k}(\mathcal{F}/\mathcal{G})\to \mathbb{R}/\mathbb{Z}$, for $k<r-1$, where $\mathcal{F} /\mathcal{G}$ is the moduli space of flat connections of $π$ under the action of a subgroup $\mathcal{G}$ of the gauge group. The differential characters of first order are related to the Dijkgraaf-Witten action for Chern-Simons Theory. The second order charact…
We shall prove that a moduli space of flat irreducible Lie algebroid connections over a compact manifold has locally a natural structure of a smooth differentiable space. This is a generalization of some well known results for the moduli space of holomorphic structures on a complex vector bundle over a compact complex manifold.
A polysymplectic structure is a vector-valued symplectic form, that is, a closed nondegenerate 2-form with values in a vector space. We first outline the polysymplectic Hamiltonian formalism with coefficients in a vector space $V$, then apply this framework to show that the moduli space $\mathcal{M}(P)$ of flat connections on a principal bundle $P$ over a compact manifold $M$ is a polysymplectic reduction of the space $\mathcal{A}(P)$ of all connections on $P$ by the action of the gauge group $\mathcal{G}$ with respect to a natural $Ω^2(M)/B^2(M)$-valued symplectic structure on $\mathcal{A}(P)…
We discuss Witten's formulas for the symplectic volumes of moduli spaces of flat connections on 2-manifolds from the viewpoint of Hamiltonian cobordism as introduced by Ginzburg-Guillemin-Karshon.
We describe the moduli spaces of meromorphic connections on trivial holomorphic vector bundles over the Riemann sphere with at most one (unramified) irregular singularity and arbitrary number of simple poles as Nakajima's quiver varieties. This result enables us to solve partially the additive irregular Deligne-Simpson problem.
Some moduli spaces of irregular connections on the trivial bundle over the Riemann sphere will be identified with Nakajima quiver varieties. In particular this enables us to associate a Kac-Moody root system to such connections (yielding many isomorphisms between such moduli spaces, via the reflection functors for the corresponding Weyl group). The possibility of 'reading' a quiver in different ways also yields numerous isomorphisms between such moduli spaces, often between spaces of connections on different rank bundles and with different polar divisors. Finally some results of Crawley-Boevey…
We use gauge theoretic and algebraic methods to examine sufficient conditions for smooth points on the moduli space of flat connections on a compact manifold and on the character variety of a finitely generated and presented group. We give a complete proof of the slice theorem for the action of the group of gauge transformations on the space of flat connections. Consequently, the slice is smooth if the second cohomology of the manifold with coefficients in the semisimple part of the adjoint bundle vanishes. On the other hand, we find that the smoothness of the slice for the character variety o…
If we consider the moduli space of flat connections of a non trivial principal SO(3)-bundle over a surface, then we can define a map from the set of perturbed closed geodesics, below a given energy level, into families of perturbed Yang-Mills connections depending on a small parameter. In this paper we show that this map is a bijection and maps perturbed geodesics into perturbed Yang-Mills connections with the same Morse index.
From a view point of the moment map, we shall introduce the notion of Einstein-Hermitian generalized connections over a generalized Kähler manifold of symplectic type. We show that moduli spaces of Einstein-Hermitian generalized connections arise as the Kähler quotients. The deformation complex of Einstein-Hermitian generalized connections is an elliptic complex and it turns out that the smooth part of the moduli space is a finite dimensional Kähler manifold. The canonical line bundle over a generalized Kähler manifold of symplectic type has the canonical generalized connection and its curvatu…
We consider the moduli space of flat $SO(2n+1)$-connections (up to gauge transformations) on a Riemann surface, with fixed holonomy around a marked point. There are natural line bundles over this moduli space; we construct geometric representatives for the Chern classes of these line bundles, and prove that the ring generated by these Chern classes vanishes below the dimension of the moduli space, generalising a conjecture of Newstead.
Fix a smooth projective curve over a field of characteristic zero and a finite set of punctures. Let G be a connected linear algebraic group. We prove that the moduli of G-bundles with logarithmic connections having fixed residue classes at the punctures is an algebraic stack of finite type.
We give some concrete examples of moduli spaces of connections. Precisely, we explain how to explicitly construct the moduli spaces of rank 2 fuchsian systems and logarithmic connections on the Riemann sphere with 4 poles. The former ones are affine cubic surfaces; the latter ones are analytically isomorphic to affine surfaces but not algebraically: they do not carry non constant regular functions. We end with some remark on arbitrary number of poles.
It is known that every nonorientable surface $Σ$ has an orientable double cover $\tildeΣ$. The covering map induces an involution on the moduli space $\tilde{\M}$ of gauge equivalence classes of flat $G$-connections on $\tildeΣ$. We identify the relation between the moduli space $\M$ and the fixed point set of the moduli space $\tilde{\M}$. In particular, $\M$ is isomorphic to the fixed point set of $\tilde{\M}$ if and only if the order of the center of $G$ is odd. One important application is that we give a way to construct a minimal Lagrangian submanifold of the moduli space $\tilde{\M}$.
It is known that there is a bijection between the perturbed closed geodesics, below a given energy level, on the moduli space of flat connections M and families of perturbed Yang-Mills connections depending on a small parameter. In this paper we study the heat flow on the loop space on M and the Yang-Mills L^2-flows for a 3-manifold N with partial rescaled metrics. Our main result is that the bounded Morse homology of the loop space on M is isomorphic to the bounded Morse homologies of the connections space of N.
We establish normal form theorems for a large class of singular flat connections on complex manifolds, including connections with logarithmic poles along weighted homogeneous Saito free divisors. As a result, we show that the moduli spaces of such connections admit the structure of algebraic quotient stacks. In order to prove these results, we introduce homogeneous Lie groupoids and study their representation theory. In this direction, we prove two main results: a Jordan-Chevalley decomposition theorem, and a linearization theorem. We give explicit normal forms for several examples of free div…
We give an explicit finite-dimensional model for the derived moduli stack of flat connections on $\mathbb{C}^k$ with logarithmic singularities along a weighted homogeneous Saito free divisor. We investigate in detail the case of plane curves of the form $x^p = y^q$ and relate the moduli spaces to the Grothendieck-Springer resolution. We also discuss the shifted Poisson geometry of these moduli spaces. Namely, we conjecture that the map restricting a logarithmic connection to the complement of the divisor admits a shifted coisotropic structure and we construct a shifted Poisson structure on the…
We consider analytic curves $\nabla^t$ of symplectic connections of Ricci type on the torus $T^{2n}$ with $\nabla^0$ the standard connection. We show, by a recursion argument, that if $\nabla^t$ is a formal curve of such connections then there exists a formal curve of symplectomorphisms $ψ_t$ such that $ψ_t\cdot\nabla^t$ is a formal curve of flat invariant symplectic connections and so $\nabla^t$ is flat for all $t$. Applying this result to the Taylor series of the analytic curve, it means that analytic curves of symplectic connections of Ricci type starting at $\nabla^0$ are also flat. The gr…
We introduce a class of metrics on gauge theoretic moduli spaces. These metrics are made out of the universal matrix that appears in the universal connection construction of M. S. Narasimhan and S. Ramanan. As an example we construct metrics on the c_{2}=1 SU(2) moduli space of instantons on R^4 for various universal matrices.
Sufficient and necessary results have been proven on Lipschitz type integral conditions and bounds of its Fourier transform for an $L^2$ function, in the setting of Riemannian symmetric spaces of rank $1$ whose growth depends on a $k$th-order modulus of continuity.
Bryant \cite{Br} proved the existence of torsion free connections with exotic holonomy, i.e. with holonomy that does not occur on the classical list of Berger \cite{Ber}. These connections occur on moduli spaces $\Y$ of rational contact curves in a contact threefold $\W$. Therefore, they are naturally contained in the moduli space $\Z$ of all rational curves in $\W$. We construct a connection on $\Z$ whose restriction to $\Y$ is torsion free. However, the connection on $\Z$ has torsion unless both $\Y$ and $\Z$ are flat. We also show the existence of a new exotic holonomy which is a certain si…
We compute the Riemannian volume on the moduli space of flat connections on a nonorientable 2-manifold, for a natural class of metrics. We also show that Witten's volume formula for these moduli spaces may be derived using Haar measure, and we give a new proof of Witten's volume formula for the moduli space of flat connections on an orientable surface using Haar measure.
We examine moduli spaces of locally homogeneous surfaces of Type~$\mathcal{B}$ with torsion where the symmetric Ricci tensor is non-degenerate. We also determine the space of affine Killing vector fields in this context.
We consider canonical symplectic structure on the moduli space of flat ${\g}$-connections on a Riemann surface of genus $g$ with $n$ marked points. For ${\g}$ being a semisimple Lie algebra we obtain an explicit efficient formula for this symplectic form and prove that it may be represented as a sum of $n$ copies of Kirillov symplectic form on the orbit of dressing transformations in the Poisson-Lie group $G^{*}$ and $g$ copies of the symplectic structure on the Heisenberg double of the Poisson-Lie group $G$ (the pair ($G,G^{*}$) corresponds to the Lie algebra ${\g}$).
We study a moduli space of ASD connections over $S^3\times \mathbb{R}$. We consider not only finite energy ASD connections but also infinite energy ones. So the moduli space is infinite dimensional in general. We study the (local) mean dimension of this infinite dimensional moduli space. We show the upper bound on the mean dimension by using a "Runge-approximation" for ASD connections, and we prove its lower bound by constructing an infinite dimensional deformation theory of periodic ASD connections.
Let $(X,x_0)$ be any one--pointed compact connected Riemann surface of genus $g$, with $g\geq 3$. Fix two mutually coprime integers $r>1$ and $d$. Let ${\mathcal M}_X$ denote the moduli space parametrizing all logarithmic $\text{SL}(r,{\mathbb C})$--connections, singular over $x_0$, on vector bundles over $X$ of degree $d$. We prove that the isomorphism class of the variety ${\mathcal M}_X$ determines the Riemann surface $X$ uniquely up to an isomorphism, although the biholomorphism class of ${\mathcal M}_X$ is known to be independent of the complex structure of $X$. The isomorphism class of t…
Vortices and coupled vortices arise from Yang-Mills-Higgs theories and can be viewed as generalizations or analogues to Yang-Mills connections and, in particular, Hermitian-Yang-Mills connections. We proved an analytic compactification of the moduli spaces of vortices and coupled vortices on hermitian vector bundles over compact Kähler manifolds. In doing so we introduced the concept of ideal coupled vortices and characterized the singularities of ideal coupled vortices as well as Hermitian-Yang-Mills connections.
We show that the prequantum line bundle on the moduli space of flat $SU(2)$ connections on a closed Riemann surface of positive genus has degree 1. It then follows from work of Lawton and the second author that the classifying map for this line bundle induces a homotopy equivalence between the stable moduli space of flat $SU(N)$ connections, in the limit as $N$ tends to infinity, and $\mathbb{C}P^\infty$. Applications to the stable moduli space of flat unitary connections are also discussed.
In this paper we study the symplectic and Poisson geometry of moduli spaces of flat connections over quilted surfaces. These are surfaces where the structure group varies from region to region in the surface, and where a reduction (or relation) of structure occurs along the boundaries of the regions. Our main theoretical tool is a new form moment-map reduction in the context of Dirac geometry. This reduction framework allows us to use very general relations of structure groups, and to investigate both the symplectic and Poisson geometry of the resulting moduli spaces from a unified perspective…
We study an infinite dimensional ASD moduli space over the cylinder. Our main result is the formula of its local mean dimension. A key ingredient of the argument is the notion of non-degenerate ASD connections. We develop its deformation theory and show that there exist sufficiently many non-degenerate ASD connections by using the method of gluing infinitely many instantons.
K-polystability is, on the one hand, conjecturally equivalent to the existence of certain canonical Kähler metrics on polarised varieties, and, on the other hand, conjecturally gives the correct notion to form moduli. We introduce a notion of stability for families of K-polystable varieties, extending the classical notion of slope stability of a bundle, viewed as a family of K-polystable varieties via the associated projectivisation. We conjecture that this is the correct condition for forming moduli of fibrations. Our main result relates this stability condition to Kähler geometry: we prove t…
Let $g$ be locally homogeneous (LH) Riemannian metric on a differentiable compact manifold $M$, and $K$ be a compact Lie group endowed with an $\mathrm {ad}$-invariant inner product on its Lie algebra $\mathfrak{k}$. A connection $A$ on a principal $K$-bundle $p:P\to M$ on $M$ is locally homogeneous if for any two points $x_1$, $x_2\in M$ there exists an isometry $φ:U_1\to U_2$ between open neighborhoods $U_i\ni x_i$ which sends $x_1$ to $x_2$ and admits a $φ$-covering bundle isomorphism preserving the connection $A$. This condition is invariant under the action of the automorphism group (gaug…
In this paper we study the relationship between three compactifications of the moduli space of Hermitian-Yang-Mills connections on a fixed Hermitian vector bundle over a projective algebraic manifold of arbitrary dimension. Via the Donaldson-Uhlenbeck-Yau theorem, this space is analytically isomorphic to the moduli space of stable holomorphic vector bundles, and as such it admits an algebraic compactification by Gieseker-Maruyama semistable torsion-free sheaves. A recent construction due to the first and third authors gives another compactification as a moduli space of slope semistable sheaves…
If $K$ is a compact Lie group and $g\geq 2$ an integer, the space $K^{2g}$ is endowed with the structure of a Hamiltonian space with a Lie group valued moment map $Φ$. Let $β$ be in the centre of $K$. The reduction $Φ^{-1}(β)/K$ is homeomorphic to a moduli space of flat connections. When $K$ is simply connected, a direct consequence of a recent paper of Bott, Tolman and Weitsman is to give a set of generators for the $K$-equivariant cohomology of $Φ^{-1}(β)$. Another method to construct classes in $H^*_K(Φ^{-1}(β))$ is by using the so called universal bundle. When the group is $\Sun$ and $β$ i…
Let $X$ be a closed, four-dimensional, oriented, smooth manifold with a Riemannian metric, $g$, let $G$ be a compact Lie group, and $P$ be a principal $G$ bundle over $X$. D. Groisser and T. Parker (1987, 1989) and S. K. Donaldson (1990) conjectured that the moduli space of $g$-anti-self-dual connections on $P$, endowed with the $L^2$ metric, has finite volume and diameter. The purpose of this article is to prove this conjecture under the following additional hypotheses. Suppose that $g$ is generic and $X$ is simply-connected. If (i) $G=SU(2)$ or $SO(3)$ and $b^+(X)=0$ or (ii) $G=SO(3)$ and $w…
Let $G$ be a simple complex Lie group, $\alg{g}$ be its Lie algebra, $K$ be a maximal compact form of $G$ and $\alg{k}$ be a Lie algebra of $K$. We denote by $X\rightarrow \overline{X}$ the anti-involution of $\alg{g}$ which singles out the compact form $\alg{k}$. Consider the space of flat $\alg{g}$-valued connections on a Riemann sphere with three holes which satisfy the additional condition $\overline{A(z)}=-A(\overline{z})$. We call the quotient of this space over the action of the gauge group $\overline{g(z)}=g^{-1}(\overline{z})$ a \emph{hyperbolic} moduli space of flat connections. We p…
In this article, we study the Kapustin-Witten equations on a closed, simply-connected, four-dimensional manifold which were introduced by Kapustin and Witten. We use the Taubes' compactness theorem in arXiv:1307.6447v4 to prove that if $(A,ϕ)$ is a smooth solution of Kapustin-Witten equations and the connection $A$ is closed to a $generic$ ASD connection $A_{\infty}$, then $(A,ϕ)$ must be a trivial solution. We also prove that the moduli space of the solutions of Kapustin-Witten equations is non-connected if the connections on the compactification of moduli space of ASD connections are all $ge…
We compute the homotopy type of the moduli space of flat, unitary connections over aspherical surfaces, after stabilizing with respect to the rank of the underlying bundle. Over the orientable surface M^g, we show that this space has the homotopy type of the infinite symmetric product of M^g, generalizing a well-known fact for the torus. Over a non-orientable surface, we show that this space is homotopy equivalent to a disjoint union of two tori, whose common dimension corresponds to the rank of the first (co)homology group of the surface. Similar calculations are provided for products of surf…
Let ${\mathcal B}_g(r)$ be the moduli space of triples of the form $(X,\, K^{1/2}_X,\, F)$, where $X$ is a compact connected Riemann surface of genus $g$, with $g\, \geq\, 2$, $K^{1/2}_X$ is a theta characteristic on $X$, and $F$ is a stable vector bundle on $X$ of rank $r$ and degree zero. We construct a $T^*{\mathcal B}_g(r)$--torsor ${\mathcal H}_g(r)$ over ${\mathcal B}_g(r)$. This generalizes on the one hand the torsor over the moduli space of stable vector bundles of rank $r$, on a fixed Riemann surface $Y$, given by the moduli space of holomorphic connections on the stable vector bundle…
We investigate Yang--Mills instanton theory over four dimensional asymptotically locally flat (ALF) geometries, including gravitational instantons of this type, by exploiting the existence of a natural smooth compactification of these spaces introduced by Hausel--Hunsicker--Mazzeo. First referring to the codimension 2 singularity removal theorem of Sibner--Sibner and Rade we prove that given a smooth, finite energy, self-dual SU(2) connection over a complete ALF space, its energy is congruent to a Chern--Simons invariant of the boundary three-manifold if the connection satisfies a certain holo…
Consider a Riemann surface $X$ of genus $g \geq 2$ equipped with an antiholomorphic involution $τ$. This induces a natural involution on the moduli space $M(r,d)$ of semistable Higgs bundles of rank $r$ and degree $d$. If $D$ is a divisor such that $τ(D) = D$, this restricts to an involution on the moduli space $M(r,D)$ of semistable Higgs bundles of rank $r$ with fixed determinant $\mathcal{O}(D)$ and trace-free Higgs field. The fixed point sets of these involutions $M(r,d)^τ$ and $M(r,D)^τ$ are $(A,A,B)$-branes introduced by Baraglia-Schaposnik. In this paper, we derive formulas for the mod …
There is a natural sequence of CY manifolds that are double covers of the projective g dimensional spaces ramified over 2g+2 hyperplanes. We observe that some of them are obtained as quotient of the action of the semi-direct product of g-1 copies of cyclic Z/2Z groups with the symmetric g group on the product of g-copies of hyper-elliptic curves of genus g. The quotient is a double cover of the projective g space ramified over 2g+2 hyperplanes. This construction generalizes the construction of a Kummer surface. The Kodaira-Spencer classes on the Jacobian are invariant under the action of the g…
We give a comparative description of the Poisson structures on the moduli spaces of flat connections on real surfaces and holomorphic Poisson structures on the moduli spaces of holomorphic bundles on complex surfaces. The symplectic leaves of the latter are classified by restrictions of the bundles to certain divisors. This can be regarded as fixing a "complex analogue of the holonomy" of a connection along a "complex analogue of the boundary" in analogy with the real case.