The modular envelope of a cyclic operad is the smallest modular operad containing it. A modular operad is constructed from moduli spaces of Riemann surfaces with boundary; this modular operad is shown to be the modular envelope of the A-infinity cyclic operad. This gives a new proof of the result of Harer-Mumford-Thurston-Penner-Kontsevich that a cell complex built from ribbon graphs is homotopy equivalent to the moduli space of curves.
We construct a new (cyclic) operad of `mosaics' defined by polygons with marked diagonals. Its underlying (aspherical) spaces are the sets of real points of the moduli space of punctured Riemann spheres, which are naturally tiled by Stasheff associahedra. We (combinatorially) describe them as iterated blow-ups and show that their fundamental groups form an operad with similarities to the operad of braid groups.
Let overline{M}_{g,n} be the moduli space of stable algebraic curves of genus g with n marked points. With the operations which relate the different moduli spaces identifying marked points, the family (overline{M}_{g,n})_{g,n} is a modular operad of projective smooth Deligne-Mumford stacks, overline{M}. In this paper we prove that the modular operad of singular chains C_*(overline{M};Q) is formal; so it is weakly equivalent to the modular operad of its homology H_*(overline{M};Q). As a consequence, the "up to homotopy" algebras of these two operads are the same. To obtain this result we prove …
We consider the extension of classical 2-dimensional topological quantum field theories to Klein topological quantum field theories which allow unorientable surfaces. We approach this using the theory of modular operads by introducing a new operad governing associative algebras with involution. This operad is Koszul and we identify the dual dg operad governing A-infinity algebras with involution in terms of Mobius graphs which are a generalisation of ribbon graphs. We then generalise open topological conformal field theories to open Klein topological conformal field theories and give a generat…
We study a pair of dual operads which arise in the study of moduli spaces of pointed genus 0 curves (this duality is similar to that between commutative and Lie algebras). These operads are both quadratic, and even Koszul, and arise in the theory of quantum cohomology.
We compute the structure of the homology of an operad built from the spaces TH_{d,n} of configurations of points in C^d, modulo translation and homothety. We find that it is a mild generalization of Getzler's gravity operad, which occurs in dimension d = 1.
In this paper we study spaces of algebras over an operad (non-symmetric) in symmetric monoidal model categories. We first compute the homotopy fiber of the forgetful functor sending an algebra to its underlying object, extending a result of Rezk. We then apply this computation to the construction of geometric moduli stacks of algebras over an operad in a homotopical algebraic geometry context in the sense of Toën and Vezzosi. We show under mild hypotheses that the moduli stack of unital associative algebras is a Zariski open substack of the moduli stack of non-necessarily unital associative al…
In this paper we answer a question raised in [25], Sec. 4, by showing that the genus zero moduli operad $\{\bar{M}_{0,n+1}\}$ can be endowed with natural descent data that allow it to be considered as the lift to ${\rm Spec}\,\Z$ of an operad over $\F_1$. The relevant descent data are based on a notion of constructible sets and constructible functions over $\F_1$, which describes suitable differences of torifications with a positivity condition on the class in the Grothendieck ring. More generally, we do the same for the operads $\{T_{d,n+1}\}$ (whose components were) introduced in [5]. Finall…
This paper is built on the following observation: the purity of the mixed Hodge structure on the cohomology of Brown's moduli spaces is essentially equivalent to the freeness of the dihedral operad underlying the gravity operad. We prove these two facts by relying on both the geometric and the algebraic aspects of the problem: the complete geometric description of the cohomology of Brown's moduli spaces and the coradical filtration of cofree cooperads. This gives a conceptual proof of an identity of Bergström-Brown which expresses the Betti numbers of Brown's moduli spaces via the inversion of…
This thesis is concerned with the application of operadic methods, particularly modular operads, to questions arising in the study of moduli spaces of surfaces as well as applications to the study of homotopy algebras and new constructions of 'quantum invariants' of manifolds inspired by ideas originating from physics. We consider the extension of classical 2-dimensional topological quantum field theories to Klein topological quantum field theories which allow unorientable surfaces. We generalise open topological conformal field theories to open Klein topological conformal field theories and c…
We introduce a construction that associates, to each finite dimensional k-vector space V, a family of projective k-varieties that comes equipped with the structure of a operad in the category of k-schemes. When dim V = 1, this operad contains, as a suboperad, the family of moduli spaces of stably marked rational curves. For general V, our operad contains the family of Chen-Gibney-Krashen moduli spaces of stably marked trees of projective spaces as a suboperad. We realize our operad as part of a larger theory that describes how to construct operads from suitable functors. Given a category C tha…
Recent algebraic structures of string theory, including homotopy Lie algebras, gravity algebras and Batalin-Vilkovisky algebras, are deduced from the topology of the moduli spaces of punctured Riemann spheres. The principal reason for these structures to appear is as simple as the following. A conformal field theory is an algebra over the operad of punctured Riemann surfaces, this operad gives rise to certain standard operads governing the three kinds of algebras, and that yields the structures of such algebras on the (physical) state space naturally.
We introduce framed formal curves, which are formal algebraic curves with boundary components parametrized by the punctured formal disk. We study the moduli space of nodal framed formal curves, which we endow with a logarithmic structure. We show that this moduli space is a smooth formal logarithmic stack. The remarkable property of our construction is that framed formal curves admit a natural operation of "gluing along the boundary" which works well in families and preserves smoothness (both in a formal and in a logarithmic sense), and this induces gluing maps on the level of moduli. Using mo…
This article generalizes the operad of moduli spaces of curves to SUSY curves. SUSY curves are algebraic curves with additional supersymmetric or supergeometric structure. Here, we focus on the description of the relevant category of graphs and its combinatorics as well as the construction of dual graphs of SUSY curves and the SUSY operad taking values in a category of moduli spaces of SUSY curves with Neveu-Schwarz and Ramond punctures.
It is shown that for any morphism, i: g --> h, of Lie algebras the vector space underlying the Lie algebra h is canonically a g-homogeneous formal manifold with the action of g being highly nonlinear and twisted by Bernoulli numbers. This fact is obtained from the study of a 2-coloured operad of formal homogeneous spaces and its minimal resolution, and is used to give a new conceptual explanation of both Ziv Ran's Jacobi-Bernoulli complex and Fiorenza-Manetti's L-infinity algebra structure on the mapping cone of a morphism of two Lie algebras. All these constructions are iteratively extended t…
This is the first of two papers in which we prove that a cell model of the moduli space of curves with marked points and tangent vectors at the marked points acts on the Hochschild co--chains of a Frobenius algebra. We also prove that a there is dg--PROP action of a version of Sullivan Chord diagrams which acts on the normalized Hochschild co-chains of a Frobenius algebra. These actions lift to operadic correlation functions on the co--cycles. In particular, the PROP action gives an action on the homology of a loop space of a compact simply--connected manifold. In this first part, we set up th…
We describe the modular operad structure on the moduli spaces of pointed stable curves equipped with an admissible $G$-cover. To do this we are forced to introduce the notion of an operad colored not by a set but by the objects of a category. This construction interpolates in a sense between `framed' and `colored' versions of operads; we hope that it will be of independent interest. An algebra over this operad is the same thing as a $G$-equivariant CohFT, as defined by Jarvis, Kaufmann and Kimura. We prove that the (orbifold) Gromov--Witten invariants of global quotients $[X/G]$ give examples …
We review several well-known operads of compactified configuration spaces and construct several new such operads, C, in the category of smooth manifolds with corners whose complexes of fundamental chains give us (i) the 2-coloured operad of A-infinity algebras and their homotopy morphisms, (ii) the 2-coloured operad of L-infinity algebras and their homotopy morphisms, and (iii) the 4-coloured operad of open-closed homotopy algebras and their homotopy morphisms. Two gadgets - a (coloured) operad of Feynman graphs and a de Rham field theory on C - are introduced and used to construct quantized r…
A theorem by Pridham and Lurie provides an equivalence between formal moduli problems and Lie algebras in characteristic zero. In his work, Lurie has distilled the axioms that the algebras appearing in the formal moduli problem need to satisfy, and worked out the case of $\mathbb{E}_\infty$-algebras using an incarnation of the Koszul duality, in the setting of $\infty$-operads. The more recent work of Calaque-Campos-Nuiten extends Lurie's work to obtain an equivalence between formal moduli problem parameterized by a colored operad, and algebras over its Koszul dual operad. This manuscript is b…
This is the second of two papers in which we prove that a cell model of the moduli space of curves with marked points and tangent vectors at the marked points acts on the Hochschild co--chains of a Frobenius algebra. We also prove that a there is dg--PROP action of a version of Sullivan Chord diagrams which acts on the normalized Hochschild co-chains of a Frobenius algebra. These actions lift to operadic correlation functions on the co--cycles. In particular, the PROP action gives an action on the homology of a loop space of a compact simply--connected manifold. In this second part, we discret…
We find a minimal differential graded (dg) operad whose generic representations in $R^n$ are in one-to-one correspondence with formal germs of those endomorphisms of the tangent bundle to $R^n$ which satisfy the Nijenhuis integrability condition. This operad is of a surprisingly simple origin -- it is the cobar construction on the quadratic operad of homologically trivial dg Lie algebras. As a by product we obtain a strong homotopy generalization of this geometric structure and show its homotopy equivalence to the structure of contractible dg manifold.
Francis Brown introduced a partial compactification $M_{0,n}^δ$ of the moduli space $M_{0,n}$. We prove that the gravity cooperad, given by the degree-shifted cohomologies of the spaces $M_{0,n}$, is cofree as a nonsymmetric anticyclic cooperad; moreover, the cogenerators are given by the cohomology groups of $M_{0,n}^δ$. This says in particular that $H^\bullet(M_{0,n}^δ)$ injects into $H^\bullet(M_{0,n})$. As part of the proof we construct an explicit diagrammatically defined basis of $H^\bullet(M_{0,n})$ which is compatible with cooperadic cocomposition, and such that a subset forms a basis …
This paper is a sequel to [LoMa] where moduli spaces of painted stable curves were introduced and studied. We define the extended modular operad of genus zero, algebras over this operad, and study the formal differential geometric structures related to these algebras: pencils of flat connections and Frobenius manifolds without metric. We focus here on the combinatorial aspects of the picture. Algebraic geometric aspects are treated in [Ma2].
In present paper we develop the deformation theory of operads and algebras over operads. Free resolutions (constructed via Boardman-Vogt approach) are used in order to describe formal moduli spaces of deformations. We apply the general theory to the proof of Deligne's conjecture. The latter says that the Hochschild complex of an associative algebra carries a canonical structure of a dg-algebra over the chain operad of the little discs operad. In the course of the proof we construct an operad of geometric nature which acts on the Hochschild complex. It seems to be different from the brace opera…
In this paper, we provide a conceptual new construction of the algebraic structure on the pair of the Hochschild cohomology spectrum (cochain complex) and Hochschild homology spectrum, which is analogous to the structure of calculus on a manifold. This algebraic structure is encoded by a two-colored operad introduced by Kontsevich and Soibelman. We prove that for a stable idempotent-complete infinity-category, the pair of its Hochschild cohomology and homology spectra naturally admits the structure of algebra over the operad. Moreover, we prove a generalization to the equivariant context.
This is a copy of the article published in IMRN (2007). I describe the noncommutative Batalin-Vilkovisky geometry associated naturally with arbitrary modular operad. The classical limit of this geometry is the noncommutative symplectic geometry of the corresponding tree-level cyclic operad. I show, in particular, that the algebras over the Feynman transform of a twisted modular operad P are in one-to-one correspondence with solutions to quantum master equation of Batalin-Vilkovisky geometry on the affine P-manifolds. As an application I give a construction of characteristic classes with values…
We prove that the degree zero Hochschild-type cohomology of the homology operad of Francis Brown's dihedral moduli spaces is equal to the Grothendieck-Teichmueller Lie algebra plus two classes. This significantly elucidates the (in part still conjectural) relation between the Grothendieck-Teichmueller Lie algebra and (motivic) multiple zeta values.
It is well known that formal solutions to the Associativity Equations are the same as cyclic algebras over the homology operad $(H_*(\bar{M}_{0,n+1}))$ of the moduli spaces of $n$--pointed stable curves of genus zero. In this paper we establish a similar relationship between the pencils of formal flat connections (or solutions to the Commutativity Equations) and homology of a new series $\bar{L}_n$ of pointed stable curves of genus zero. Whereas $\bar{M}_{0,n+1}$ parametrizes trees of $\bold{P}^1$'s with pairwise distinct nonsingular marked points, $\bar{L}_n$ parametrizes strings of $\bold{P}…
We consider moduli spaces of quilted strips with markings and their compactifications. Using the theory of moment maps of toric varieties we identify the compactified moduli spaces with certain graph associahedra. We demonstrate how these moduli spaces govern the combinatorics of A-infinity n-modules, which are natural generalizations of A-infinity modules (n=1) and bimodules (n=2).
The semi-classical approximation is an explicit formula of mathematical physics for the sum of Feynman diagrams with a single circuit.In this paper, we study the same problem in the setting of modular operads (see dg-ga/9408003); instead of being a number, the interaction at a vertex of valence n is an S_n-module. As an application, we calculate the S_n-equivariant Hodge polynomials of the moduli spaces \Mbar_{1,n}.
It is shown that every algebra over the chain operad of the little disks operad gives naturally rise to a Hertling-Manin's F-manifold, that is a smooth manifold equipped with an integrable graded commutative associative product on the tangent sheaf. In particular, moduli spaces of extended deformations of complex/symplectic structures are shown to have a canonical structure of F-manifold. With the help of the $G_\infty$-operad a strong homotopy version of the notion of F-manifold is constructed. Among natural examples of $F_\infty$-manifolds one finds formal manifolds associated with the Hochs…
The purpose of this paper is to explain and to generalize, in a homotopical way, the result of Barannikov-Kontsevich and Manin which states that the underlying homology groups of some Batalin-Vilkovisky algebras carry a Frobenius manifold structure. To this extent, we first make the minimal model for the operad encoding BV-algebras explicit. Then we prove a homotopy transfer theorem for the associated notion of homotopy BV-algebra. The final result provides an extension of the action of the homology of the Deligne-Mumford-Knudsen moduli space of genus 0 curves on the homology of some BV-algebr…
We define an Artin stack which may be considered as a substitute for the non-existing (or empty) moduli space of stable two-pointed curves of genus zero. We show that this Artin stack can be viewed as the first term of a cyclic operad in the category of stacks. Applying the homology functor we obtain a linear cyclic operad. We formulate conjectures which assert that cohomology of a smooth projective variety has the structure of an algebra over this homology operad and that gravitational quantum cohomology can naturally expressed in terms of this algebra. As a test for these conjectures we show…
In this article, we develop the geometry of canonical stratifications of the spaces $\mathcal{M}_{0,n}$ and prepare ground for studying the action of the Galois group $Gal (\overline{\mathbb{Q}} /\mathbb{Q})$ upon strata. We define and introduce a version of a gravity operad constructed for a class of moduli spaces $\mathcal{M}_{0,n}$, equipped with a hidden holomorphic involution. This additional symmetry is associated to a split quaternionic structure. We introduce a categorical framework to present this object. Interaction between the geometry, physics and the arithmetics are discussed. An …
Several topological and homological operads based on families of projectively weighted arcs in bounded surfaces are introduced and studied. The spaces underlying the basic operad are identified with open subsets of a compactification due to Penner of a space closely related to Riemann's moduli space. Algebras over these operads are shown to be Batalin-Vilkovisky algebras, where the entire BV structure is realized simplicially. Furthermore, our basic operad contains the cacti operad up to homotopy, and it similarly acts on the loop space of any topological space. New operad structures on the ci…
Modular operads are a special type of operad: in fact, they bear the same relationship to operads that graphs do to trees (i.e. simply connected graphs). One of the basic examples of a modular operad is the collection of Deligne-Mumford-Knudsen moduli spaces $\bar{M}_{g,n}$ of stable pointed algebraic curves; hence the word ``modular.'' In this paper, we introduce various constructions on differential graded modular operads, notably a duality which we call the Feynman transform, which extends Kontsevich's graph complexes. Our main result is the calculation of the Euler characteristic of the Fe…
Let Spec(A) be an affine derived stack. We give two proofs of the existence of a canonical map from the moduli space of shifted Poisson structures (in the sense of Pantev-Toën-Vaquié-Vezzosi, see http://arxiv.org/abs/1111.3209 ) on Spec(A) to the moduli space of homotopy (shifted) Poisson algebra structures on A. The first makes use of a more general description of the Poisson operad and of its cofibrant models, while the second in more computational and involves an explicit resolution of the Poisson operad.
We show that Verdier duality for certain sheaves on the moduli spaces of graphs associated to Koszul operads corresponds to Koszul duality of operads. This in particular gives a conceptual explanation of the appearance of graph cohomology of both the commutative and Lie types in computations of the cohomology of the outer automorphism group of a free group. Another consequence is an explicit computation of dualizing sheaves on spaces of metric graphs, thus characterizing to which extent these spaces are different from oriented orbifolds. We also provide a relation between the cohomology of the…
We construct a functor that associates to any dg cooperad of dg commutative algebras (satisfying some conditions) an augmented commutative algebra. When applied to the cohomology operad of Francis Brown's moduli spaces it produces an algebra that formally models the algebra of multiple zeta values. We prove that there is an injection from the graded dual of the Grothendieck-Teichmueller Lie algebra into the indecomposables of the algebra associated to the Gerstenhaber cooperad, and that there is a morphism from the algebra associated to Brown's moduli spaces to the algebra associated to the Ge…
The main theme of this work is the study of the operations that naturally exist on moduli spaces of maps $Map(S,X)$, also called the space of branes of $X$ with respect $S$. These operations will be constructed as operations on the (quasi-coherent) derived category $\D(Map(S,X))$, in the particular case where $S$ has some close relations with an operad $\OO$. More precisely, for an $\s$-operad $\OO$ and an algebraic variety $X$ (or more generally a derived algebraic stack), satisfying some natural conditions, we prove that $\OO$ acts on the object $\OO(2)$ by mean cospans. This universal actio…
A part of Grothendieck's program for studying the Galois group $G_{\mathbb Q}$ of the field of all algebraic numbers $\overline{\mathbb Q}$ emerged from his insight that one should lift its action upon $\overline{\mathbb Q}$ to the action of $G_{\mathbb Q}$ upon the (appropriately defined) profinite completion of $π_1({\mathbb P}^1 \setminus \{0,1, \infty\})$. The latter admits a good combinatorial encoding via finite graphs "dessins d'enfant". This part was actively developing during the last decades, starting with foundational works of A. Belyi, V. Drinfeld and Y. Ihara. Our brief note conce…
This paper is a sequel to the paper by A. Losev and Yu. Manin [LoMa1], in which new moduli stacks $\bar{L}_{g,S}$ of pointed curves were introduced. They classify curves endowed with a family of smooth points divided into two groups, such that the points of the second group are allowed to coincide. The homology of these stacks form components of the extended modular operad whose combinatorial models are further studied in [LoMa2]. In this paper the basic geometric properties of $\bar{L}_{g,S}$ are established using the notion of weighted stable pointed curves introduced recently by B. Hassett.…
We propose an explicit relation between the cohomology of compactified and noncompactified moduli spaces of algebraic curves with punctures. This relationship generalizes one between commutative algebras and Lie algebras proposed by Lazard, Kontsevich and Ginzburg and Kapranov. More explicitly, we show that the cohomology of one moduli space is the graph complex decorated with the cohomology of the other, which in its turn generalizes Getzler's result for the genus zero moduli. We also show that a certain class of algebras over the chain operad of compactified moduli spaces has a natural struc…
We analyze and completely describe the four cases when the Hitchin fibration on a $2$-dimensional moduli space of irregular Higgs bundles over $\mathbb{C}P^{1}$ has a single singular fiber. The case when the fiber at infinity is of type $I_0^*$ is further analyzed, and we give constructions of all the possible configurations of singular curves inelliptic fibrations having this type of singular fiber at infinity.
We define and study the stack ${\mathcal U}^{ns,a}_{g,g}$ of (possibly singular) projective curves of arithmetic genus g with g smooth marked points forming an ample non-special divisor. We define an explicit closed embedding of a natural ${\mathbb G}_m^g$-torsor over ${\mathcal U}^{ns,a}_{g,g}$ into an affine space and give explicit equations of the universal curve (away from characteristics 2 and 3). This construction can be viewed as a generalization of the Weierstrass cubic and the j-invariant of an elliptic curve to the case g>1. Our main result is that in characteristics different from 2…
We introduce and study several new topological operads that should be regarded as nonsymmetric analogues of the operads of little 2-disks, framed little 2-disks, and Deligne-Mumford compactifications of moduli spaces of genus zero curves with marked points. These operads exhibit all the remarkable algebraic and geometric features that their classical analogues possess; in particular, it is possible to define a noncommutative analogue of the notion of cohomological field theory with similar Givental-type symmetries. This relies on rich geometry of the analogues of the Deligne-Mumford spaces, co…
We study the moduli of G-local systems on smooth but not necessarily proper complex algebraic varieties. We show that, when suitably considered as derived algebraic stacks, they carry natural Poisson structures, generalizing the well known case of curves. We also construct symplectic leaves of this Poisson structure by fixing local monodromies at infinity, and show that a new feature, called strictness, appears as soon as the divisor at infinity has non-trivial crossings.
In this paper we consider a canonical compactification of Hitchin's moduli space of stable Higgs bundles with fixed determinant of odd degree over a Riemann surface, producing a projective variety by gluing in a divisor at infinity. We give a detailed study of the compactified space, the divisor at infinity and the moduli space itself. In doing so we reprove some assertions of Laumon and Thaddeus on the nilpotent cone.
We define motivic Milnor fiber of cyclic $L_\infty$-algebras of dimension three using the method of Denef and Loeser of motivic integration. It is proved by Nicaise and Sebag that the topological Euler characteristic of the motivic Milnor fiber is equal to the Euler characteristic of the étale cohomology of the analytic Milnor fiber. We prove that the value of Behrend function on the germ moduli space determined by $L$ is equal to the Euler characteristic of the analytic Milnor fiber. Thus we prove that Behrend function depends only on the formal neighborhood of the moduli space.
