These are lecture notes based on a series of talks given by the authors at the CIMPA Summer School on Algebraic Geometry and Hypergeometric Functions held in Istanbul in Summer of 2005. They provide an introduction to a recent work on the complex ball uniformization of the moduli spaces of Del Pezzo surfaces, K3 surfaces and algebraic curves of lower genus. We discuss the relationship of these constructions with the Deligne-Mostow theory of periods of hypergeometric differentianl forms. For convenience to a non-expert reader we include an introduction to the theory of periods of integrals on algebraic varieties with emphasis on abelian varieties and K3 surfaces.
The moduli space of cubic threefolds in CP4, with some minor birational modifications, is the Baily-Borel compactification of the quotient of the complex 10-ball by a discrete group. We describe both the birational modifications and the discrete group explicitly.
In this article we provide further evidence for the monstrous proposal of Daniel Allcock, by giving a plausible but still conjectural explanation for the deflation relation in the Coxeter group quotient of the orbifold fundamental group.
We construct small desingularizations of moduli spaces of semistable quiver representations for indivisible dimension vectors using deformations of stabilites and a dimension estimate for nullcones. We apply this construction to several classes of GIT quotients.
We study moduli spaces of certain sextic curves with a singularity of multiplicity 3 from both perspectives of Deligne-Mostow theory and periods of K3 surfaces. In both ways we can describe the moduli spaces via arithmetic quotients of complex hyperbolic balls. We show in Theorem 7.4 that the two ball-quotient constructions can be unified in a geometric way.
We analyze the relationship between two compactifications of the moduli space of maps from curves to a Grassmannian: the Kontsevich moduli space of stable maps and the Marian--Oprea--Pandharipande moduli space of stable quotients. We construct a moduli space which dominates both the moduli space of stable maps to a Grassmannian and the moduli space of stable quotients, and equip our moduli space with a virtual fundamental class. We relate the virtual fundamental classes of all three moduli spaces using the virtual push-forward formula. This gives a new proof of a theorem of Marian-Oprea-Pandha…
We prove a result on the singularities of ball quotients $Γ\backslash\CC H^n$. More precisely, we show that a ball quotient has canonical singularities under certain restrictions on the dimension $n$ and the underlying lattice. We also extend this result to the toroidal compactification $(Γ\backslash\CC H^n)^*$.
A moduli space of stable quotients of the rank n trivial sheaf on stable curves is introduced. Over nonsingular curves, the moduli space is Grothendieck's Quot scheme. Over nodal curves, a relative construction is made to keep the torsion of the quotient away from the singularities. New compactifications of classical spaces arise naturally: a nonsingular and irreducible compactification of the moduli of maps from genus 1 curves to projective space is obtained. Localization on the moduli of stable quotients leads to new relations in the tautological ring generalizing Brill-Noether constructions…
The moduli space of holomorphic maps from Riemann surfaces to the Grassmannian is known to have two kinds of compactifications: Kontsevich's stable map compactification and Marian-Oprea-Pandharipande's stable quotient compactification. Over a non-singular curve, the latter moduli space is Grothendieck's Quot scheme. In this paper, we give the notion of `$ε$-stable quotients' for a positive real number $ε$, and show that stable maps and stable quotients are related by the wall-crossing phenomena. We will also discuss Gromov-Witten type invariants associated to $ε$-stable quotients, and investig…
Motivated by constructing moduli spaces of unstable objects, we use new ideas in non-reductive GIT to construct quotients by parabolic group actions. For moduli problems with semistable moduli spaces constructed by reductive GIT, we consider associated instability (or HKKN) stratifications, which are often closed related to Harder-Narasimhan stratifications, and construct quotients of the unstable strata under various stabiliser assumptions by further developing ideas of non-reductive GIT. Our approach is to construct parabolic quotients in stages, in order for the required stabiliser assumpti…
Let $X$ be a projective normal toric variety and $T_0$ a rank one subtorus of the defining torus of $X$. We show that the normalization of the Chow quotient $X//T_0$, in the sense of Kapranov-Sturmfels-Zelevinsky, coarsely represents the moduli space of stable log maps to $X$ with discrete data given by $T_0\subset X$.
Recent results in geometric invariant theory (GIT) for non-reductive linear algebraic group actions allow us to stratify quotient stacks of the form [X/H], where X is a projective scheme and H is a linear algebraic group with internally graded unipotent radical acting linearly on X, in such a way that each stratum [S/H] has a geometric quotient S/H. This leads to stratifications of moduli stacks (for example, sheaves over a projective scheme) such that each stratum has a coarse moduli space.
Some ball-quotient orbifolds are related by covering maps. We exploit these coverings to find infinite towers of orbifolds uniformized by the complex 2-ball and some orbifolds over K3 surfaces uniformized by the 2-ball. Corresponding lattices are all arithmetic and commensurable. We also give, along with infinitely many reducible examples, an infinite series of irreducible curves along which the projective plane is uniformized by the product of two 1-balls.
We study the Fano surface S of the Fermat cubic threefold. We prove that S is a degree 81 abelian cover of the degree 5 del Pezzo surface and that the complement of the union of 12 disjoint elliptic curves on S is a ball quotient. The lattice of this ball quotient is related to the Deligne-Mostow lattice number 1.
We describe periods of irreducible holomorphic manifolds of $K3^{[n]}$-type with a non-symplectic automorphism of prime order $p\geq 3$. These turn out to lie on complex ball quotients and we are able to give a precise characterization of when the period map is bijective, by introducing the notion of $K(T)$-generality.
We define a natural compactification of an arrangement complement in a ball quotient. We show that when this complement has a moduli space interpretation, then this compactification is often one that appears naturally by means of geometric invariant theory. We illustrate this with the moduli spaces of smooth quartic curves and rational elliptic surfaces.
We study Deraux's non arithmetic orbifold ball quotient surfaces obtained as birational transformations of a quotient $X$ of a particular Abelian surface $A$. Using the fact that $A$ is the Jacobian of the Bolza genus $2$ curve, we identify $X$ as the weighted projective plane $\mathbb{P}(1,3,8)$. We compute the equation of the mirror $M$ of the orbifold ball quotient $(X,M)$ and by taking the quotient by an involution, we obtain an orbifold ball quotient surface with mirror birational to an interesting configuration of plane curves of degrees $1,2$ and $3$. We also exhibit an arrangement of f…
Let $C$ be a hyperelliptic curve of genus $g \geq 3$. We give a new description of the theta map for moduli spaces of rank 2 semistable vector bundles with trivial determinant. In orther to do this, we describe a fibration of (a birational model of) the moduli space, whose fibers are GIT quotients $(\mathbb{P}^1)^{2g}//\operatorname{PGL(2)}$. Then, we use recent results of Kumar to identify the restriction of the theta map to these GIT quotients with some explicit osculating projection. As a corollary of this construction, we obtain a birational equivalence between the ramification locus of th…
When a reductive group $G$ acts linearly on a complex projective scheme $X$ there is a stratification of $X$ into $G$-invariant locally closed subschemes, with an open stratum $X^{ss}$ formed by the semistable points in the sense of Mumford's geometric invariant theory which has a categorical quotient $X^{ss} \to X//G$. In this article we describe a method for constructing quotients of the unstable strata. As an application, we construct moduli spaces of sheaves of fixed Harder-Narasimhan type with some extra data (an '$n$-rigidification') on a projective base.
We describe hypergeometric functions of Deligne-Mostow type for open subsets of the configuration space of six points on P^2, induced from those for seven points on P^1. The seven point ball quotient example DM(2^5,1^2) does not appear on Mostow's original list, but does appear on Thurston's corrected version. We show that DM(2^5,1^2) is a finite cover of the moduli space of cubic surfaces M_C endowed with the ball quotient structure G_C\B^4 of Allcock, Carlson, and Toledo. This answers a question of Allcock about the commensurability of G_C with the monodromy groups of Deligne-Mostow hypergeo…
We define hypergeometric functions using intersection homology valued in a local system. Topology is emphasized; analysis enters only once, via the Hodge decomposition. By a pull-back procedure we construct special subsets S_{pi}, derived from Hurwitz spaces, of Deligne-Mostow moduli spaces DM(n,mu). Certain DM(n,mu) are known to be ball quotients, uniformized by hypergeometric functions valued in a complex ball (i.e., complex hyperbolic space). We give sufficient conditions for S_{pi} to be a subball quotient. Analyzing the simplest examples in detail, we describe ball quotient structures att…
We construct some non-arithmetic ball quotients as branched covers of a quotient of an Abelian surface by a finite group, and compare them with lattices that previously appear in the literature. This gives an alternative construction, which is independent of the computer, of some lattices constructed by the author with Parker and Paupert.
We give an explicit description of the 3-ball quotients constructed by Couwenberg-Heckman-Looijenga, and deduce the value of their orbifold Euler characteristics. For each lattice, we also give a presentation in terms of generators and relations.
We study the $L^2$--cohomology of certain local systems on non-compact arithmetic ball quotients $X=Γ\backslash \B_n$, in particular vanishing and non--vanishing results. We also give generalizations to higher dimensional ball quotients and study the mixed Hodge structure on the sheaf cohomology of a local system with the $L^2$-cohomology contributing to the lowest weight part.
We study the number of distinct ways in which a smooth projective surface $X$ can be realized as a smooth toroidal compactification of a ball quotient. It follows from work of Hirzebruch that there are infinitely many distinct ball quotients with birational smooth toroidal compactifications. We take this to its natural extreme by constructing arbitrarily large families of distinct ball quotients with biholomorphic smooth toroidal compactifications.
We study the problem of non-existence of totally geodesic complex ball quotients in the open Torelli locus in a moduli space of principally polarized Abelian varieties using analytic techniques.
S. Kondo has constructed a ball quotient compactification for the moduli space of non-hyperelliptic genus four curves. In this paper, we show that this space essentially coincides with a GIT quotient of the Chow variety of canonically embedded genus four curves. More specifically, we give an explicit description of this GIT quotient, and show that the birational map from this space to Kondo's space is resolved by the blow-up of a single point. This provides a modular interpretation of the points in the boundary of Kondo's space. Connections with the slope nine space in the Hassett-Keel program…
The purpose of this note is to show that $2K$ of any smooth compact complex two ball quotient is very ample, except possibly for four pairs of fake projective planes of minimal type, where $K$ is the canonical line bundle. For the four pairs of fake projective planes, sections of $2K_M$ give an embedding of $M$ except possibly for at most two points on $M$.
We prove that various arithmetic quotients of the unit ball in $\mathbb{C}^n$ are Mordellic, in the sense that they have only finitely many rational points over any finitely generated field extension of $\mathbb{Q}$. In the previously known case of compact hyperbolic complex surfaces, we give a new proof using their Albanese in conjunction with some key results of Faltings, but without appealing to the Shafarevich conjecture. In higher dimension, our methods allow us to solve an alternative of Ullmo and Yafaev. Our strongest result uses in addition Rogawski's theory and establishes the Mordell…
We give explicit estimates for the volume of the Green-Griffiths jet differentials of any order on a toroidal compactification of a ball quotient. To this end, we first determine the growth of the logarithmic Green-Griffiths jet differentials on these objects, using a natural deformation of the logarithmic jet space of a given order, to a suitable weighted projective bundle. Then, we estimate the growth of the vanishing conditions that a logarithmic jet differential must satisfy over the boundary to be a standard one.
We announce the construction of toroidal partial compactifications of the moduli spaces of mixed Hodge structures with polarized graded quotients. They are moduli spaces of log mixed Hodge structures with polarized graded quotients. We include an application to the analyticity of zero loci of some functions.
In this paper, we study punctured spheres in two dimensional ball quotient compactifications $(X, D)$. For example, we show that smooth toroidal compactifications of ball quotients cannot contain properly holomorphically embedded $3$-punctured spheres. We also use totally geodesic punctured spheres to prove ampleness of $K_X + αD$ for $α\in (\frac{1}{4}, 1)$, giving a sharp version of a theorem of the first author with G. Di Cerbo. Finally, we produce the first examples of bielliptic ball quotient compactifications modeled on the Gaussian integers.
We determine the Lyapunov spectrum of ball quotients arising from cyclic coverings. The computations are performed by rewriting the sum of Lyapunov exponents as ratios of intersection numbers and by the analysis of the period map near boundary divisors. As a corollary, we complete the classification of commensurability classes of all presently known non-arithmetic ball quotients.
In this paper we show that the moduli space of nodal cubic surfaces is isomorphic to a quotient of a 4-dimensional complex ball by an arithmetic subgroup of the unitary group. This complex ball uniformization uses the periods of certain K3 surfaces which are naturally associated to cubic surfaces. A similar uniformization is given for the covers of the moduli space corresponding to geometric markings of the Picard group or to the choice of a line on the surface. We also give a detailed description of the boundary components corresponding to singular surfaces.
Let $(({\mathbb B} / Γ_1)', T(1))$ be á torsion free toroidal compactification with abelian minimal model $(A_1, D(1))$. An arbitrary principal isogeny $μ_a : A_2 \rightarrow A_1$, $a \in {\mathbb C}$ pulls-back $(A_1, D(1))$ to the abelian minimal model $(A_2, D(2))$ of a torsion free toroidal compactification $(({\mathbb B} / Γ_2)', D(2))$. The present work makes use of the isogeny pull-backs of abelian ball quotient models, towards the construction of infinite series of mutually non-birational co-abelian torsion free Galois covers $(({\mathbb B} / Γ_n)', T(n))$ of a ball quotient compactifi…
Let X_n := \bar M_{0,n}, the moduli space of n-pointed stable genus zero curves, and let X_{n,m} be the quotient of X_n by the action of the symmetric group S_{n-m} on the last n-m marked points. The cones of effective divisors of X_{n,m}, m = 0,1,2, are calculated. Using this, upper bounds for the cones Mov(X_{n,m}) generated by divisors with moving linear systems are calculated, m = 0,1, along with the induced bounds on the cones of ample divisors of \bar M_g and \bar M_{g,1}. As an application, the cone of effective divisors of \bar M_{2,1} is analyzed in detail.
We extend the methods of geometric invariant theory to actions of non--reductive groups in the case of homomorphisms between decomposable sheaves whose automorphism groups are non--reductive. Given a linearization of the natural action of the group $\Aut(E)\times\Aut(F)$ on Hom(E,F), a homomorphism is called stable if its orbit with respect to the unipotent radical is contained in the stable locus with respect to the natural reductive subgroup of the automorphism group. We encounter effective numerical conditions for a linearization such that the corresponding open set of semi-stable homomorph…
We establish a method for calculating the Poincaré series of moduli spaces constructed as quotients of smooth varieties by suitable non-reductive group actions; examples of such moduli spaces include moduli spaces of unstable vector or Higgs bundles on a smooth projective curve, with a Harder-Narasimhan type of length two. To do so, we first prove a result concerning the smoothness of fixed point sets for suitable non-reductive group actions on smooth varieties. This enables us to prove that quotients of smooth varieties by such non-reductive group actions, which can be constructed using Non-R…
Let X' be the toroidal compactification of the quotient of the complex 2-ball by a torsion free lattice G of SU(2,1). We say that X'is co-abelian if there is an abelian surface, birational to X'. The present work can be viewed as an illustration for the presence of a plenty of non-compact co-abelian torsion free toroidal compactifications. More precisely, it shows that all the admissible values for the volume of a torsion free quotient of the complex 2-ball are attained by co-abelian Picard modular ones over Eisenstein numbers. The article provides three types of infinite series of finite unra…
Let $Γ\subset \mathbf{PU}(2,1)$ be a lattice which is not co-compact, of finite Bergman-covolume and acting freely on the open unit ball $\mathbf{B} \subset \mathbb{C}^2$. Then the compactification $X = \bar{Γ\setminus \mathbf{B}}$ is a smooth projective surface with an elliptic compactification divisor $D = X \setminus (Γ\setminus \mathbf{B})$. In this short note we discover a new class of unramified ball-quotients $X$. We consider ball-quotients $X$ with $kod(X) = h^1(X, \mathcal{O}_X) = 1$. We prove that all minimal surfaces with finite Mordell-Weil group in the class described become after…
In connection with our previous investigation about Siegel threefolds which admit a Calabi--Yau model, we consider ball quotients which belong to the unitary group $\U(1,3)$. In this paper we determine a very particular example of a Picard modular variety of general type. Really we determine the ring of modular forms. This algebra has 25 generators, 15 modular forms $B_i$ of weight one and ten modular forms $C_j$ of weight 2. Both will appear as Borcherds products. We determine the ideal of relations. The forms $C_i$ are cuspidal. Their squares define holomorphic differential forms on the non-…
We prove the generic exclusion of certain Shimura varieties of unitary and orthogonal types from the Torelli locus. The proof relies on a slope inequality on surface fibration due to G. Xiao, and the main result implies that certain Shimura varieties only meet the Torelli locus in dimension zero.
